


Mapping Galaxies

by Creator_Chaos



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal
Genre: Developing Relationship, Human Astral, Other, Post-Anime, nonbinary Astral
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-22
Updated: 2017-05-31
Packaged: 2018-05-08 12:23:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 33,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5496935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Creator_Chaos/pseuds/Creator_Chaos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four years after zir departure from earth, Astral finds that ze can no longer stay away. Returning is full of joy, but also confusion, as ze begins to navigate human life and relationships; particularly one that no one else had really considered a possibility.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“Yuuma.”

The boy sat up quickly, wiping the sleep away from his eyes as they found the luminescent figure in the doorway. “Astral! I thought you were going to say goodbye in the morning.” A smile spread across his sleepy features; after their latest battle, he and his friends were resting in Astral World before returning home, and laying in the dark with the constant glow of the plane shimmering outside had reminded him of falling asleep in his hammock to Astral’s gentle glow. Something had kept him from seeking his friend out, but the delight he felt that ze had come to him… well, he wouldn’t think too much about it, but he was happy.

“I was considering,” Astral stated, and then stopped as if that was zir whole sentence. Ze floated over to Yuuma’s bed and perched on the edge, and only continued when he tilted his head and gave zir a quizzical stare. “Though we were able to spend quite a bit of time dueling together recently, we have had little time to talk, and it has been quite a while since we were able to exchange letters.”

“Yeah, I wish there was an easier way to get things across dimensions.” He gave a bittersweet smile. “Have you convinced Eliphas to work on getting cellphone towers here?”

Astral gave a chuckle that warmed Yuuma’s heart. “I have broached the topic with him, but I believe our engineers have several projects they consider more important to complete before undertaking such a difficult endeavor.”

Yuuma sighed with a smile, shifting to sit more upright, his hand brushing against Astral’s as he did. He left it there as he said, “Well, Kaito’s still doing his inter-dimensional research, so if he hasn’t figured it out yet, I don’t think anyone here could.”

“I would be insulted if I did not believe you were correct.” The two of them chuckled, and in the silence that followed Astral spoke again. “What of the others, our friends?”

“Oh, we’re all the same as ever really, just older.”

“I have noticed that, Yuuma, though I cannot say the same for myself. You are now taller than I am.”

“What? No way!” He jumped off the bed, grabbing Astral by the arms and pulling zim up with him to stand eye-to-eye. Or eye-to-brow, as it were—Yuuma exceeded zim by over an inch. He pumped his fist in the air. “And it only took me four years! Kattobingu!”

“I hardly believe that is the cause of your growth,” Astral groaned, then appeared thoughtful. “Though I cannot say the same for the state of your hair. How did that come about?”

Yuuma froze and dropped his fist, running his hand sheepishly through hair now a still-unruly two inches, dark pink strands mixing with black at his brow. “I, uh, heh, lost a bet to Tetsuo.”

Astral shook zir head with a smile. “Same as ever indeed. Nevertheless, it is… how would you say… a good look for you.”

“Haha, thanks, but you couldn’t have said the same when I first shaved it off. It wasn’t a bad day overall though,” he continued thoughtfully, “Alito and Kotori got back together then. Of course, they broke up again last week, but we’ll see how long that lasts.”

“You refer to… some specific relationship they share, yes? What was it… dating?” Astral frowned. “Were not Kotori and you engaging in dating at some point?”

“Astral, that was years ago,” Yuuma chided. “She’s been on-and-off with Alito for a while now.”

“On-and-off?”

“Yeah, he keeps doing stupid things to piss her off. Like that time he convinced me and her to go on a double date with him and failed to mention we’d both be dating him.”

Astral’s head was tilted in confusion, but Yuuma just laughed and shook his head. Even if Astral didn’t understand the meaning behind some of the things he told zim, it was still nice to be able to tell zim about his life outside of inter-dimensional catastrophes.

“You have engaged in dating with several people, then?”

“Eh,” he replied, scratching his head and shrugging. “Depends what you mean I guess. I’ve gone on a lot of dates. What was it…” He counted off on his fingers. “Five with Kotori, six if you count the one with Alito… three with Cathy… two with Anna… two with Alito, three if you count the one with Kotori… two with Michael… one with Shark, he won’t admit it was a date but it totally was… Shingetsu asked me out a few times—“ Yuuma saw a murderous expression flash in Astral’s eyes and hurriedly continued, “but Shark told him that he’d reinvent Barian World and throw him in it if he touched me, so yeah… that’s how I got Shark on that one date though. But I haven’t really dated anyone like, in a relationship.” Yuuma suddenly laughed nervously, sitting back down and slapping his hands on his knees. “So, that catches you up on my dating history!” Why had he felt the need to present Astral with an inventory of it?

“I see,” Astral nodded solemnly. “I am happy to know of your life.”

Silence fell again, and the dim glowing outside the window reminded Yuuma that this was precious time not to be wasted, but with all the time he spent yearning for Astral to once again be a constant part of his life, he could not think of anything important to talk about.

“It has not gotten easier.”

Astral’s words cracked like a whip across the silence. Yuuma looked to him, startled from his reverie. “What?”

“Being without you. I thought that when I returned to my home, when I remembered the duties I had that did not involve you, this feeling would fade. But it has not, and I have not felt at home since I returned here. I do not know if I ever actually felt this to be my home.”

Yuuma’s head reeled, trying to make sense of the sudden confession. “What feeling?”

“It is an aching, somewhere deep inside me. At first it was dull and quiet and I thought it would be fleeting, but it has only grown worse, and it is strongest at these times, when I know that the next day will bring your absence once more.” Ze clenched Yuuma’s hands atop the bed. “I do not understand, but I do not think I can bear another parting with this aching inside me.”

“Then I won’t go.” Yuuma could barely talk past the sudden lump in his throat, and he’d somehow managed to lace his fingers together with Astral’s so that their hands locked them together from across the bed. “I won’t go, I’ll stay with you.”

Astral’s face, previously suffused with emotion, seemed to snap shut in a vice of logic. “No. No, I cannot ask you to do that. I should not have said—“

Ze tried to pull zir hands away, but Yuuma gripped tighter and tugged back hard, leaving zir inches away from his face. “You’re not asking me anything! Dammit, Astral, you’re the one who left me!” He saw something break in zir eyes and immediately regretted his words. “That’s not what I meant. Just…” He straightened and loosened his hold on zir hands, holding them gently in his own. “You said you had to go back, and I had to keep living my life, and I’ve been trying, but if you want me…” His voice cracked, and he cursed the emotions that he wouldn’t name for blocking his throat when he could finally speak them. “If you want me to stay, then I’ll… I’ll do anything to be with you.”

Astral stared at him rivetedly, and he’d never seen an expression quite so torn on zir face before. “It is not simply what we want. A living soul could never be allowed to reside in Astral World.”

“Then come back with me!”

“I could never be allowed to leave my post. I would be brought back if I went to Earth.”

He would have almost thought that ze was just making excuses, if ze didn’t look close to tears. “Then we won’t go to Earth!” He wasn’t sure what he was saying, or how they had gotten here. He just knew there had to be a way for them to stay together. “There are all sorts of other places, right? We’ll go somewhere they won’t find us! We can run forever if we have to!”

“Yuuma… we cannot…” But there was a look of hope in zir eyes that he wasn’t going to let go of.

“We can do anything together.” He spread their fingers until they laid tip-to-tip, palm-to-palm, a reminder of what the gesture used to be, and looked at zim through their splayed fingers. “Haven’t we already proven that?”

\---

“Where’s Yuuma?”

It was a cursory question first thing in the morning as they prepared to head back to earth. Shark and Rio were the only ones accompanying Yuuma this time (it had been a _small_ disaster, after all, and Shark wondered to himself how much they’d actually been needed and how much this was a way to get Yuuma a free trip to Astral World).

But as the time for their departure approached, the question was asked with more urgency. And before long, “Where’s Yuuma?” was accompanied by a second question, “Where’s Astral?” And Yuuma wasn’t responding on his D-gazer and Astral wasn’t responding to Eliphas’ summons, and the denizens of Astral World began to fear that the latest evil had returned and done them harm. But Shark and Rio looked at each other and knew they had other ideas, and when the search parties formed they set out on their own.

\---

Their hands had remained locked all the way from Yuuma’s bed on passed the edge of the city, Astral leading them down a pathway that started as smooth river pebbles, but whose rocks grew larger and jagged as they went. “The barriers are thin here,” ze told him. “We will make it out of Astral World soon.”

Yuuma nodded. He hadn’t asked where they were going. He didn’t much care. He just knew, with every step, every sudden drop, every slip that made him scramble and scrape his hands on the rough rocks, they moved further away from the forces that separated them.

Eventually Yuuma slid down one particularly steep slope, hit even ground, and paused, panting. “You need to rest?” Astral asked him, concern in zir voice.

“Is that alright?” he asked between gasps. He was exhausted—he hadn’t slept since their battle, and he’d been hard-pressed to keep up with Astral’s effortless glide—but the thought of what they’d left looming behind them made him want to press on.

“We are quite a distance away already,” ze replied, pointing back the way they’d come. He could see the city faintly above the cliffs they’d descended, but it seemed too fuzzy for the apparent distance, like between it and them lay a heavy fog, or maybe a swath of sheer fabric. “We can rest here for a while.”

Yuuma nodded, taking unsteady steps forward as he straightened. The ground here seemed to be made of large, ancient boulders, but they were worn away and interlocked and coated with thick layers of moss in such a way that made for even footing. The same rocks as the ones that scraped his knees rose sporadically in isolated spires—he hadn’t noticed when he’d been trying not to fall on them, but they were a shiny cobalt blue. He found a swell in the ground with a soft bed of moss and sat down. “Where is this place?”

“It is an in-between space,” Astral replied, floating over and perching beside him. “It has… a foot in two dimensions, as it were. If we continue on, we will enter another dimension.”

Yuuma squinted towards where ze gestured, and saw vague, cloudy shapes in the distance. “What’s that dimension?”

“I am not highly familiar with it,” Astral admitted. “But it will be safe enough for a while. Long enough to make plans.”

He nodded. He didn’t want to think about plans right now, and, if he could judge from Astral’s voice, neither did ze. “Let me know when we need to keep going, I can make it.”

“I will. Rest for now.”

Yuuma lay back on the ground, expecting the exhaustion in his body to drag him into sleep immediately. But his mind kept him awake, racing from thought to thought before he could ever identify more than the lump they put in his throat. He tried counting the blue spires within his field of vision, but their glistening blue brought only one thing to mind, and soon his eyes drifted with his mind to the pale shimmering being beside him.

“Have I ever told you you’re beautiful?”

Astral blinked at him, surprised by his voice. “No, I do not believe so. Why?”

Yuuma gave a sigh of laughter as he sat up; trust zir to miss the meaning by miles. “Because I was just thinking it.”

“That I am beautiful?” ze asked in surprise. “Why would you be thinking that?”

Now he couldn’t help but laugh outright. “Why do you think? Because it’s true!”

“O-oh.” Astral considered this with a confused expression. “I have never given much thought to my appearance. I am unable to change it as you are, so it seems a futile thing to consider.”

“But you don’t need to change anything anyways.”

Astral’s body did something strange at his words—a sort of shift in tone of zir luminescence, and Yuuma wondered for a heart-stopping moment if ze was blushing. “Then, what is it?” ze asked softly, looking up at the sky and carefully away from him. “That makes me beautiful?”

“You’re… you’re radiant,” he said, trying to remember all the ways he’d described Astral to himself in these pining intervening years. “You look like you’re made of stars. Like a galaxy I want to map every star of…” He hadn’t realized he’d been moving closer to zim, but he stopped when he felt their knees brush.

Though Astral lacked many of the tells that gave away emotion in human bodies (shaky breath, sweaty palms, crimson cheeks), Yuuma believed he may have found another—an uneven undulation in zir glow that seemed to broadcast disruption.

“I… also find you aesthetically pleasing,” ze finally said, blinking as ze turned zir eyes to his.

He laughed again, harder than he should have, casting his embarrassment out with his breath. “Do you really?”

“I do,” ze replied, tilting zir head in confusion at his laughter. “More so now, I believe, that your hair is not quite so outlandish.”

“What?!” Yuuma sputtered. “You’re one to talk!” He reached out to Astral to demonstrate his point, sifting his fingers through the upward swirl of zir hair. Only it didn’t quite feel like hair, more like supple glass, or spider webs, or tiny streams of water…

“Yuuma, there is a look in your eyes.”

“Is there?” he asked breathlessly. “What kind of look?”

“It is… a look I like very much,” Astral replied uncertainly, leaning towards Yuuma until their noses almost brushed. “What does it mean?”

Yuuma fought the urge to look away, willing himself to keep showing Astral the message in his eyes, hoping it would convey what he couldn’t explain in words. “I love you.”

Astral blinked once, but did not move or look away. “I have heard you say this before to others, but not to me. And it sounds different, somehow, now.”

Yuuma swallowed once and nodded, shaking with the effort of maintaining eye contact that was stripping his soul bare. “It is different. The way I love you, I… I’ve never loved anyone else like this.”

Zir eyes softened in a thoughtful expression. “And this is what the look in your eyes means.”

“Yes.”

Zir mouth turned up in a small smile. “Then I think I understand. Yes. I also feel this love for you, Yuuma, and only you.”

Yuuma asked quickly, before he could second-guess himself. “Can I kiss you?”

Astral’s reply, only moments delayed, was barely a whisper. “Yes.”

Yuuma tilted his head so that their lips met, eyes snapping shut as he did so because there was, after all, only so much he could bear to show. Astral’s lips were inhumanly smooth and cool, and pliant beneath Yuuma’s inexperienced pressure.

It lasted only a moment before he pulled back, opening his eyes slowly to gauge Astral’s reaction. Zir eyes were already open wide (had ze kept them open the whole time?) and zir mouth hadn’t twitched from the barely-parted position they had taken during the kiss. Yuuma swallowed hard passed the lump in his throat. “Astral?”

“So…” ze said slowly, bringing zir fingertips to zir lips. “That was a kiss.”

Yuuma’s mouth dropped open. “You didn’t even know what a kiss was? Why would you tell me that I could kiss you?”

“Because you may do whatever you like with me, Yuuma.”

It was said so innocently, so simply, that he felt a shiver run over his body before he knew how to process it. “Don’t say that, Astral.”

Ze cocked zir head. “Why ever not?”

He stood suddenly, spinning around and hoping Astral couldn’t see how furiously he was blushing. “Come on, let’s go!”

“But Yuuma,” ze called, floating up beside him. “Are you not going to rest?”

“Oh, right.” He stopped mid-step and sat down, throwing his arms over his face as he lay on his side.

He heard Astral give a bemused chuckle before he his head was gently lifted onto zir lap. Their eyes met and, miraculously, in a moment he fell asleep.

 


	2. Chapter 2

Astral watched Yuuma’s chest rise and fall with his steady breath. There were many things ze missed about zir time on earth, but the one ze’d never been able to share in their letters or visits, because ze was the only one to experience them, was the long nights spent in Yuuma’s attic. They were lonely at first. The TV was usually on, sound turned down enough to let Yuuma sleep; ze would watch it when shows ze liked, like ESPer Robin, were on, or when ze tried to comprehend the function of the items that the people on TV insisted would make zir life easier. But as time went on, ze found zimself watching the only other movement in the room—the shapes his mouth formed as he mumbled in his sleep, the twitches in his limbs when noises from the street disturbed him, the flickering beneath his eyelids as he dreamed. Ze had some awareness that this behavior would be off-putting to Yuuma’s human sensibilities, but there was something enthralling about watching him that made Astral choose to simply make sure ze was back in front of the TV or inside the key when he woke in the morning.

Ze hadn’t expected to have this opportunity again. His face was different now, older, with a faint shadow across his jawline. But his now shaggy, rumpled hair softened the new angles in his face, and he remained essentially, familiarly, Yuuma.

Ze’d never been able to touch him then, on Earth, either. Of course, ze understood that humans were particular about touch, and ze didn’t think that the brief, electric brushing of their lips earlier changed that for them, but even the weight of his head on zir lap was a euphoric burden. Zir hand hovered above his face for a moment, feeling the gentle warmth of his breath, before ze drifted down to lightly graze zir fingertips over the edges of his hair.  

“Cute,” ze heard a masculine voice call out from above them. Zir head shot up and ze scanned the cliffs as a feminine voice added, “Ten out of ten, would watch again.”

Yuuma leapt from zir lap as ze spotted Shark and Rio halfway down the cliff face. Ze made some rapid calculations—they could get a head start across the plane while the twins negotiated their way down, but then it would be simple speed versus speed, and would Yuuma be able to outrun them both with Shark’s extra few inches, and did ze know where they were headed enough to lose them once they passed through the next barrier and into the other dimension…

A sharp gasp startled zim, and ze looked back toward Yuuma to find that zir fingers were digging bruises into his arm. Ze pulled back, darting several feet above and away, as ze was suddenly flooded with a wave of guilt. What was ze doing, thinking of ways to keep Yuuma away from his dearest friends? Away from the life he belonged in and deserved to live?

Yuuma’s expression was conflicted, but he didn’t look like he planned to run. “Spying is rude you know,” he called out to them, standing and watching as they scaled the cliff.

They landed on even ground and Shark strode ahead, meeting Yuuma face to face. “So is disappearing in the middle of the night. Not that I’d care, but they’re not gonna send us back until they find you two, and I have an entrance exam this weekend.”

“Oh,” Yuuma muttered, eyes casting down as he flushed. “Sorry.”

Rio reached Shark and threw her arm around his shoulders. “Don’t sweat it, it’s not like he was going to study anyway.” Shark scowled at her and shrugged her arm off.

“How did you find us?” Yuuma asked, giving a half-hearted, sheepish smile.

“They sent out search groups,” Rio supplied. “We went where they didn’t, since we figured Astral would be smart enough to run where they wouldn’t look. Isn’t that right, Astral?” she challenged, raising an eyebrow at zim.

“Not smart enough, apparently,” ze replied softly. “I did not think even anyone else in Astral World knew this way. Clearly I overestimated its secrecy.”

They laughed, Shark speaking up again. “Oh, I’m sure no one in Astral World knows about it. But this is half Barian World. Or did you forget?”

Astral winced. “Yes… yes, I suppose I did.”

“But hey, how did you know we ran away together?” Yuuma asked. “We could have been gone for any reason.”

The twins looked at each other with an eye-roll as their response.

Astral couldn’t bear avoiding the real subject any longer. “I’m sorry, this is my fault.”

“What?” Yuuma demanded as the twins gave zim questioning looks.

Ze continued, “I’ll make sure they know that when we go back. They’ll send you all home quickly.”

“What do you mean, go back?” Yuuma demanded more forcefully, spinning to fully face Astral.

Astral forced the words out. “Yuuma, we… we knew this was foolish, we simply did not want to acknowledge it.”

“Speak for yourself!” he yelled.

“Yuuma, please, you know we cannot…”

“You said you—you couldn’t bear to part from me again!” he continued over zim. “You said you love me!”

There was such a sharp edge of injured accusation in his voice that Astral couldn’t meet his eyes. Ze had said that, and it was true, if ze was correct that the look in Yuuma’s eyes had reflected that aching desire in zir chest, but perhaps ze hadn’t understood what the expectations from that sentiment were.

There was silence for a moment, aside from Yuuma’s panting breath, until Shark let out a quiet, “Huh.” When ze glanced at him, he and Rio were exchanging a look, eyebrows raised knowingly. “Well, we didn’t come to take you back,” he continued.

“We came because we know you two are idiots who have no idea what you’re doing,” Rio finished.

“That’s not…” Yuuma started, then broke off, eyes darting to the ground. “It’s just… there was nothing else _to_ do.”

“Right,” Shark sneered.

Astral’s guilt was choking zim, forcing zim to speak. “This is my fault,” ze said again. “If I had not sought Yuuma out and told him… told him…”

“Told me the truth?” Yuuma demanded. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve waited to hear that?” His teeth were clenched, and Astral was horrified to see tears welling in his eyes, but he shook his head angrily and turned to the twins. “Running was my idea anyway. Ze said I couldn’t stay in Astral World and ze couldn’t stay on earth, so I said we’d just have to go somewhere else.”

“Sounds like a Yuuma plan,” Rio sighed.

“I do not understand how you are all so flippant about this,” Astral said, voice shaking and surprising zimself as much the others. Ze sank to the ground, looking between the trio before zim. “I have made a grave error. I attempted to take Yuuma away from his friends, from his life, for purely selfish reasons.”

“You didn’t kidnap me!” Yuuma snapped. “I want to be with you!”

Ze looked at him and ze knew, ze _knew,_ it could never be that simple for them, but god, when Yuuma looked at zim like that…

“Well, are you just gonna scream and cry about it, or are you gonna let us help you figure out what to do?”

“Shark…” Yuuma’s expression softened as he looked at him, and Astral also turned in surprise.

“What?” he shrugged. “We’re your friends. Your big queer crush on an alien doesn’t change that.”

And it was at those words, silly as they were, that Astral became completely overwhelmed. These were Yuuma’s friends, and they wanted to help them be together, even though ze had tried to steal him from them, but it didn’t matter if they wanted to help because they could never be together, separated by galaxies and realities and duties, however much the two of them wanted to be, and ze shouldn’t want this, shouldn’t want what ze could never have, to keep Yuuma by zir side and to zimself, when ze _was_ an alien, so alien to these mortals ze’d befriended, but they wanted to help zim anyway…

“ASTRAL!”

Ze tried to look at Yuuma, to see why he was calling zir name, but ze couldn’t see much of anything now. Zir vision was glowing—or, wait—perhaps it was that zir body was glowing, too bright and uneven, the light spilling from zir eyes also blinding zim.

“We have to get zim help!” one of the twins cried, ze couldn’t tell who, just that the voice wasn’t Yuuma’s, wasn’t the only thing ze could focus on over the sound of tearing that filled zir ears and zir head…

It would be inaccurate to say ze lost consciousness—ze did not sleep, and ze was nothing _but_ consciousness. But ze did lose awareness of anything other than the feeling of breaking into pieces.

\--- 

Yuuma held Astral’s feather-light body in his arms all the way back to the city, even after Rio called for help; even after Eliphas showed up, brimming with cold disapproval, and teleported them back; even after several of the denizens of Astral World tried to pry zim away from him, and he screamed at them that they weren’t taking Astral away. Shark worried about the response that would get, but they seemed to understand—Yuuma had become well-liked over his numerous visits to the dimension, and the source of his distress was obvious. Astral was no longer strobing violently, but zir body had dimmed dangerously, apart from erratic bursts of light, and was limp and still besides the occasional twitching of zir eyelids or fingers.

One of the astral beings Shark thought he’d seen before—Ena, was it?—drew back from Yuuma to converse with Eliphas. Yuuma finally turned his gaze from Astral to them, a frantic expression on his face as they talked, until he shouted, “What’s wrong with zim? What’s wrong with Astral?”

They turned, and Ena started, “Astral is shattering.”

Rio gasped as Yuuma shrieked, “What?!” Shark felt a jolt in his chest at her words.

Eliphas put his hand on her shoulder and said harshly, “This needn’t be discussed now.”

“This is long past needing to be discussed,” she replied sharply. “And Astral and zir friends need to be part of it.”

There were calls of assent from the surrounding populace, and Shark reflected on how much even the original inhabitants had changed since the reunification of the Astral and Barian worlds. He felt a vague pride that it was due to the influence of _his_ world that they were making demands for Astral—they would have acquiesced to whatever Eliphas had commanded before.

Eliphas shot a glance around the room and frowned, but gave a curt nod of assent. Ena approached Astral and Yuuma again and knelt beside them, and though Yuuma tightened his grip on zim, she merely placed a hand on Astral’s forehead. Her glowing body dimmed slightly, the light seeming to flow through her hand and into Astral, whose eyes twitched more intensely before cracking open.

“Astral!” Yuuma sighed in relief, shifting so that he could prop zim up, leaving zim basically sitting in his lap with an arm supporting zir back.

“Wh…what… is happening?” ze asked slowly, dazedly bringing a hand to zir chest.

“She… she said you…” Yuuma tried to respond, choking on every other word. Of course, he was crying now. God Yuuma, Shark begged silently, don’t do this now. “She said you’re… _shattering_.”Astral’s eyes snapped open fully, confusion replaced by sharp intensity.

“You wanna elaborate on that?” Rio asked tightly, eyes narrowed at Ena.

“Indeed I do,” Ena replied. “Astral’s soul—which, in Astral’s case, is zir entirety—is shattering, splitting into pieces. If nothing is done, Astral’s soul will become irreparable, and ze will cease to exist.”

Stunned silence greeted this announcement. Astral struggled to sit further upright, Yuuma making small noises of concern as ze did. “Why is this happening to me?”ze asked Ena, voice small and shaking. Shark stole a glance at Eliphas while Ena prepared her words—he didn’t look pleased with the conversation, but his jaw was set tightly as if to prevent himself from intervening.

“You have experienced too much,” she said gently. “Lived too much for a bare soul to take.”

“What does that mean?” Yuuma demanded angrily. “What else is Astral supposed to do than live?”

“But Astral is not alive,” Ena told him. “Astral exists, but only as a soul. And souls were not made to bear living alone.”

Yuuma and Rio both looked as confused as Shark felt, and he was disturbed to see that Astral did not seem to have a clearer grasp than them either. Ena sighed. “You know for what purpose you were created, Astral.”

“To protect this world, and be its envoy,” Astral responded, a hint of strength creeping into zir voice. “To keep chaos in check.”

“Yes,” Eliphas finally cut in forcefully, and Shark wondered if he was afraid of how Ena might have phrased Astral’s purpose. “And we needed an envoy without chaos of their own. So you were kept a pure soul, separate from the chaotic taint of life.”

“But… that was deemed unnecessary, was it not?” Astral questioned weakly. “When Yuuma dueled you and you restored me after my injury from Number 96, you said that this chaos was not harmful. And now the worlds are together once more, and we recognize the need for balance, not supremacy, between order and chaos.”

“That is not at issue,” Ena assured zim. “The issue is not what is acceptable, but what you are capable of enduring. As we’ve said, you were created to be separate from chaos, and so you existed as a pure soul. But Astral,” and at this she took zir hand gently, “souls are not meant for experience. That is why souls reside in mortal bodies—to be able to experience and grow. But without a body to buffer them, souls cannot endure such experience. When experiences cannot reside in the body, they begin to penetrate the soul, burrowing cracks that will eventually split it apart.”

“And… this is what has happened to me,” Astral said softly. Shark’s head was reeling, but he still managed to register the horrified expression on Yuuma’s face.

“Has already happened to you,” she corrected, casting a significant glance at Yuuma.

Astral gave a sharp gasp, and considering that ze didn’t even need to breath, ze must have been shocked indeed. “This is… why I was fragmented in my first battle with Don Thousand?”

Ena looked to Eliphas, who grudgingly said, “We tried to keep you from exposure to chaos as much as possible; but nevertheless, the trauma of that battle was great enough that even your minimal exposure became enough to splinter you.”

“And the parts of myself I lost then, they became the Mythirian numbers, and…” Astral looked into Yuuma’s eyes, and Yuuma squeezed zir free hand tightly. “Is this… is this also why the other numbers scattered when I first encountered Yuuma?”

Ena nodded. “Your souls were drawn together, but Yuuma’s part is now a living soul, so you could not reunite with it as you eventually did with the Numbers. But Yuuma’s experiences, so vast compared to your own, strained your soul’s fracture points further, scattering more pieces from you. Those, of course, have returned to you, but they remain only tenuously connected.”

“Then,” Yuuma whispered, but he’d been silent for so long that his soft voice startled those around him, “then it’s my fault that… that Astral is… dying?”

Astral squeezed his hand and, taking zir other hand back from Ena, wiped the tears from Yuuma’s cheeks. “Do not blame yourself. I am not dying.” Ze gave a wan smile. “Did you not hear? I have never lived.”

Yuuma slapped zir hand away from his face, but didn’t release the other. “Don’t you give me the same bullshit they are!” he yelled, eyes squeezing shut. “You’ve made friends and eaten food and you like stupid TV shows and you feel friendship and betrayal and love! You’re alive!”

Shark narrowed his eyes, wondering if Yuuma’s closed eyes were intentional so that he didn’t have to see the tears in Astral’s eyes that his words gave rise to.

Eliphas gave a frustrated sigh. “Perfect examples of why Astral has come to this.” Yuuma flinched, shoulders shaking as he now gripped both of Astral’s hands. “But there is a way to halt this process.”

Astral and Yuuma both looked at him in shock, but Shark grit his teeth angrily. “You couldn’t have gotten to that sooner?” he demanded.

“We need to do it quickly, before you are damaged further,” Eliphas continued, ignoring Shark aside from a slight furrowing of his brow. “We will remove the memories that are wedged in your soul to keep them from splitting it further.”

There was a collective gasp from the three humans present. Astral’s eyes were round as ze took zir hand back from Yuuma’s and placed it on zir chest. “My memories? But… my memories are all that I am!”

“That doesn’t even make any sense!” Rio snapped, voice shaking in outrage. “Ze will just make new memories anyway. There has to be a better answer than that!”

Eliphas raised an eyebrow. “There is no need for Astral to make new memories. Astral did not form any between the first battle with Don Thousand and the present.”

“Is that true?” Yuuma asked breathlessly, but Astral, looking stricken, made no reply.

“Have you never wondered why you have no memories between your original battle with Don Thousand and encountering Yuuma?” Ena asked gently, turning from Eliphas back to Astral. “You were not allowed to form any.”

Astral’s eyes focused on her. “I was held in stasis, like when I was damaged by Number 96?” She nodded. “Did… did I consent to this?”

“You knew nothing else,” she said gently.

Astral looked ill. “Well I will not now.” Zir eyes hardened. “I would rather cease existing altogether than lose the experiences I have gained, and who they have made me.”

“Astral, you can’t mean that!” Yuuma cried, gripping zir shoulders. “You’ll lose your memories anyway if you die!”

“That is not true, though,” ze said with a sad smile, lifting Yuuma’s hands from zir shoulders and holding them in zir own. “I will no longer be myself, but my memories will be intact. Just as they existed without me as Numbers. They will not die.”

“Astral, at least you would be alive!”

“I would not be alive, to keep existing. I would be closed off from all the things you yourself said made me alive. Come, Yuuma, under any other circumstances you would tell me what a hollow and empty existence that would be. Would my mere existence comfort you so?”

Yuuma was sobbing openly now, and Shark wanted to tell him to stop (he wasn’t sure why—Yuuma had cried over many more stupid things), but then Rio grabbed his arm and he realized that he, too, was shaking.

Eliphas, looking cross, was about to speak, try to convince Astral to change zir mind, Shark assumed, but Ena cut across him. “There is one other possibility.”

“There is not!” Eliphas boomed, and suddenly his anger wasn’t even thinly veiled any longer.

Ena stood and leveled her gaze at him, the softness she’d had for Astral transforming into an expression as hard and unflinching as a mountain range. “You are trying to keep our most powerful guardian, whatever the cost may be. You are afraid; you were created through our desire to banish our chaos, and you fear what will become of you when those ways change. But can you not see that your desire to continue your existence stems from that same chaos?”

Ena turned from Eliphas’ frozen expression back to Astral. “Removing your experiences would be only a temporary measure—any experience you have in the future would result in the same outcome faster, and it is unclear how much we could keep you from it. We were unable to do so this time, with the cataclysmic shifts occurring for our world—and clearly, you would not have consented to it regardless.” Astral nodded, hanging on her words. “How you have been forced to exist is unsustainable, but it may be reparable—by giving you what would have prevented this in the first place.”

Yuuma still looked confused, but Shark could tell that Astral had already reached the same realization he had. Ze asked tentatively, “You mean… a life?”

Ena nodded. “This should allow your experiences to be drawn out of your soul and exist with you as life experiences do. Without your experiences dividing your soul, and with a body to hold it together, your soul may have a chance to mend.”

Yuuma started to blink away his tears, slowly registering where the conversation was going. Astral looked like ze’d been presented with a gift ze was afraid would be snatched away before ze could grab it. “I… I would be…”

“Human,” she confirmed.

“This is not a panacea,” Eliphas interjected, teeth clenched. But he’d lost much of his fury—it seemed that Ena’s accusation had cut him deeply.

“This is true,” Ena acquiesced. “There are dangers to the choice to live as well—a life cut short, traumatic experience, these may damage your soul more before you are able to repair. And if your soul in too damaged to maintain a life in the first place, you’ll shatter immediately. But it is another choice for you to make.”

Shark was surprised to see Astral hesitate, but he guessed he shouldn’t have been—ze had served this realm for eons; it was a duty ze had put before zimself and, at times, even Yuuma. Even if those ze served had treated zim as no more than a weapon to be torn apart and rebuilt, turning zir back on that duty couldn’t be easy. But then Yuuma whispered, “Astral?” and zir expression solidified.

“Yes,” ze said, glancing between Ena and Eliphas unflinchingly. “I wish to try.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all the kudos and comments! (Including the reblogs with tags, I stalked them all because I'm constantly desperate for feedback.) Hope I didn't keep you waiting too long, my goal is to update at least once a month. 
> 
> Not totally happy with the pov in this chapter, I don't think I'm particularly good at thinking like Shark, but I wanted to keep the pov somewhat distanced in the second scene. Let me know what you think and what you'd like to see in the future; I'm having a lot of fun writing this, so please let me know if you enjoy it too! Thanks for reading!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I'm a little past my month goal, been traveling a lot for work and grad school interviews recently. Not a whole lot of romance this chapter, but a whole lot of Astral being adorable, so I hope you enjoy! Thanks for reading!

Yuuma figured he should be more disoriented. Within less than a day by human reckoning (How long had it actually been? A few hours?), he had run away with Astral, confessed his love to Astral, had those feelings reciprocated, had his first kiss, seen Astral collapse, been told Astral was going to die, and then been told Astral would, very shortly, become human. But he was too full of something (excitement? adrenaline? terror?) to think beyond each present moment.

Astral was able to float a few inches off the floor, gripping Yuuma’s shoulder for support, and as they left the large chamber where they all had gathered, the denizens of Astral World called out to zim, wishing zim well, expressing their gratitude for zir service. He felt zir fingers digging into his shoulder tighter.

Ena and a surprisingly acquiescent Eliphas accompanied them to the building that, with a combination of astral power and Kaito’s inventions, allowed them to travel between Heartland and Astral World. Eliphas approached the portal, then turned to Astral. “Are you truly committed to doing this?”

Yuuma had to grit his teeth from how hard Astral’s fingers dug into his shoulder, but instead of pulling away he placed his other hand atop zirs. Finally, ze replied, “Yes.”

Eliphas turned to the portal without another word, placing his hands on the rim and muttering under his breath. A white glow spread from his hands through the rim, before flowing from the rim into the center of the portal and disappearing in a flash. “Astral will go through first,” he announced, staring intently at the portal. “It will form an appropriate body for whatever plane it leads to, so Astral will have a human body upon arriving in the human world.”

With that, he turned and strode toward the exit, looking dead ahead. Astral, who had finally loosened zir grip on Yuuma’s shoulder, pushed off him and met Eliphas before he could leave. “I understand that you have only done what you believed you must. You were willing to die for the worlds—I know you care for them. But so was I—so please understand that I am also doing what I believe I must.”

Eliphas finally met zir eyes and gave a single nod, before passing out through the door. Astral turned back to them, and Yuuma felt a swell of pride. “I do still wish to be able to protect the worlds,” ze said to Ena.

“Of course. We will call on you, all of you,” she replied, gesturing to everyone in the room, “if we have need. But I believe you will have time before that call comes.”

Astral nodded with a small smile. “Are we prepared to depart then?”

“There is one more thing you should know,” Ena replied, and she took both Astral and Yuuma’s hands in her own, zirs in her right and his in her left. “Astral, if you are able to heal your fragmented soul, you will live out a human life. This means that both of you will pass into death one day.” Yuuma quirked his brows—why was she being such a downer when Astral was just about to start really living? “When that time comes, your souls may be able to truly merge once more.” She looked into each of their eyes while Yuuma still tried to process her words. “I would like to see you whole once more.”

With that, she released them and gestured to the portal. “Whenever you are ready.”

Astral nodded, moving towards the portal with a focused expression. “Wait,” ze said suddenly, turning as if ze’d forgotten something.

“What—“ Yuuma started, before his lips were covered by zirs in a feather-light kiss. “What?!” he squeaked when ze pulled away. He could hear Shark and Rio sniggering behind them.

“I thought that I might feel things differently with a human body, so I wanted to be sure I remembered how it felt before.” Ze stopped, looking at Yuuma in confusion, and he could feel the heat radiating from his face. “Did I do something wrong?”

“N-no,” he managed, shaking his head. “Just—just hurry up and go!” he finally blurted.

Astral made a disgruntled face at him before moving back to the portal. Just before passing through, ze turned back to him with a smile. “I will see you there,” ze said, before zir luminescence merged with the glowing portal.

Yuuma, itching to go, grabbed Shark and Rio and pulled them with him as soon as Astral was through. They complied good-naturedly (Shark with a minimal amount of grumbling), but Yuuma remembered to turn back to Ena before they stepped through. “Thanks!” he called, voice jubilant as he imagined a future with Astral always there, always by his side, always within arm’s reach…

She broke into a smile. “Thank you, Yuuma.” As they passed through, Yuuma thought he heard her add, “Astral World isn’t the same without you.”

\---

A very human, but nevertheless very Astral, body lay on the floor before the portal when they arrived on the other side in Heartland Tower. Yuuma’s heart dropped as he raced to zir side, flipping zim into his lap. “Astral?!”

Rio crouched beside him, pressing her fingers to zir neck. “Ze has a pulse.”

“I’m going to get Kaito,” Shark called as he ran through an open door.

“Astral, can you hear me?” Yuuma put a hand on zir cheek, shaking zir head gently. “Astral?”

Ze gave a groan, like someone being woken from a deep sleep, and both Yuuma and Rio let out baited breaths. Blind panic fading, he was able to take Astral in for the first time.

The greatest difference, of course, was zir skin. Any human skin would be a sharp contrast to the pale blue glow that had been zir body—zirs happened to be a cool brown. The markings and gems that once speckled zir body were gone—or were they? There were patches of silver hair at zir brow, where gems had once been, before zir hair faded into a bluish-white; and at the base of zir neck, twin perfectly round birthmarks. The shapes were all the same, though—upturned nose, small and pointed; wide cheekbones and broad cheeks; even the slightly bent, pointed tip to zir ears. In his haste to take zim in, his eyes roved down to zir body (lithe and lean as always), before he realized ze was naked and quickly redirected his gaze to zir face. Well, he told himself as he shed his vest and placed it over zir waist, he hadn’t even been able to make out what he’d seen, so it probably didn’t count.

When zir eyes opened, they were wide and dichromatic, one a vivid gold, the other the palest gray. “Yuu… ma…?” Zir voice was mostly a whisper, and the part that wasn’t cracked.

“Yes,” he replied with a smile and a voice as broken as zirs. “Astral, it’s me. We’re home.”

Thudding footsteps approached from the hallway and skidded to a stop. “Holy shit,” Kaito hissed, “you were serious!”

Zir eyes turned toward the noise. “What…” Ze tried to lift zir head and turn to see, but ze fell back into Yuuma’s lap with a sharp gasp.

“Astral, what’s wrong?” Yuuma demanded. “Are you hurt?”

“Yes,” ze hissed on an inward breath.

“What hurts?”

“…Everything,” ze managed, gasping for breath. “I feel… everything… augh!” Ze squeezed zir eyes shut, shaking, and when that wasn’t enough ze pressed the heels of zir hands against zir eyes.

“Astral! Astral, hang in there, it’s gonna be okay! Just breathe!”

“Orbital!” Kaito was suddenly on Astral’s other side. “Let’s get zim to the examination room.” He helped lift Astral into Yuuma’s arms—zir weight, though still light, was strangely substantial—and led them to a room that Orbital zoomed into just before them. “Lay zim here,” Kaito ordered, gesturing at an examination table in the middle that Orbital darted around, setting up and turning on surrounding equipment.

“Astral, can you hear me?” he asked as Yuuma placed zim down gently. “Do you know who I am?”

“K-Kaito?” ze asked, one eye cracking open to see.

“That’s right. Can you tell me what’s happening to you?”

"I..." Astral's breath was shallow and rapid. "I don't..."

"Alright, I'm going to give you a sedative. It won't knock you out, but it will dull any pain you have and help you calm down so we can figure out what's going on." Kaito gestured Orbital over, who swiftly administered an injection in the crook of Astral's arm. Ze bared zir teeth with a groan, but zir breathing soon slowed. 

“Astral…” Yuuma whispered, rubbing zir hand with his thumb. Ze flinched at the contact and he pulled away with a gasp.

“Everything is… too much,” ze whispered. “The light is too bright, and your voices are too loud, and the room is too cold, and your hands are too hot, and my body, my body is too heavy…”

Yuuma threw a panicked expression at Kaito, who surveyed Astral thoughtfully. “We’ll find out if anything is wrong,” he said in a softer voice than before. “Just try to relax for now.”

Yuuma opened his mouth to demand _what do you mean if anything is wrong, clearly something is wrong,_ but a sharp look from Kaito and a nod at Astral made him hesitate. Kaito came around the table as Orbital started on the medical equipment, grabbing Yuuma by the arm and pulling him over to the doorway (where, he noticed for the first time, Shark and Rio waited anxiously).

“Tell me what happened,” Kaito ordered.

So Yuuma recounted how and why Astral gained a human body (leaving out the parts about running away and confessing, because, while he still thought it was a reasonable enough choice, he could imagine Kaito’s reaction to that). The twins clarified a few points he’d failed to explain properly, and then Rio continued hesitantly, “They did warn that Astral might already be too damaged to-“

She broke off when Yuuma tensed beside her. No, that couldn’t be it—sure, Ena had mentioned it, but he’d hardly given it any thought. Astral was strong, too strong to fall apart over this, something ze wanted, surely…

“Well, let’s not jump to conclusions,” Kaito interjected into the silence. “We’ll see what the tests show.”

Yuuma knew that Kaito would be able to get him answers faster than any hospital or doctor ever could; but it still wasn’t fast enough. He shifted from foot to foot, squeezing his nails into his palm. Kaito gave him a quelling look, and he crossed his arms to keep still. After another moment, Rio put an arm around him, placing her hands gently on his, and he realized he'd dug red scratches into his arms.   
Finally, Orbital wheeled back over to them.

“Master Kaito, the subject’s body is unharmed and performing all necessary functions. All I’ve found that could explain the subject’s distress is some unusual brain activity centered in the sensory and somatic areas, particularly the parietal lobe.”

“What does that mean?” Yuuma demanded.

“Okay,” Kaito murmured, “okay, that could be a good sign.”

“How?”

“Astral said everything was too much. This might just be due to zir being overloaded with bodily experiences ze’d never had before.”

“A-Astral?!” Orbital beeped in alarm, but Kaito ignored him.

“As long as ze starts showing some improvement soon, I don’t think we’ll need to worry.”

After that, Kaito stepped away and joined Orbital at the medical equipment, and Yuuma was resigned to another painful waiting. Shark and Rio occasionally said something, to him or each other, and a few times tried to get him to step out of the room or at least sit down, but he couldn’t manage to pay them much attention. At some point Rio stepped out and he could hear her talking in the hallway, but he couldn’t focus enough to make out the words. All of his attention was eaten up by the form stretched out on the bed, occasionally twitching or cringing but growing increasingly still.

Finally, Kaito returned. “Ze’s stabilized. You can go see zim.”

For a moment, Yuuma’s legs seemed to be locked in place, but Shark knocked him across the shoulder impatiently and growled, “Well, you gonna go see your space lover?”

“What?” he heard Kaito mutter as his legs unlocked and he stumbled forward.

“Astral?” he asked tentatively, drawing up to his bedside. “What’s going on with you?”

Astral’s face looked drawn, but ze opened zir eyes and looked at him sideways. “I have made a great many more observations about the nature of humans,” Astral said, mouth quirking into a weak but teasing smile.

Yuuma huffed, sitting himself forcefully into the chair by zir bedside. “You’re the worst, Astral!”

“Am I?” ze asked, smile still playing on zir lips. “My apologies.” Zir voice remained wonderfully familiar, only acquiring a greater solidity in tone to replace the ethereal, echoic quality it previously possessed.

He pouted. “But really, how are you feeling?”

“It is… far more manageable now. It seems that I cease being aware of many things—the bed beneath me, the position of my body, the buzzing of electrical equipment—until I specifically think about them, or they change.”

“Yeah, that’s how that works.”

“Fascinating. I had not anticipated that so much of human existence involved shutting off experiences one is capable of.” Ze lifted a hand, shaking with the effort, and flexed zir fingers. “I do not believe I anticipated being capable of so many experiences.”

"Not to alarm you, but there's a lot more to experience outside of a medical room."

Astral smiled, stronger this time. "I can think of something I have still yet to experience here."

"Oh?"

Astral laid zir hand on his shoulder and pulled him down toward zim, pressing their lips together. Yuma heard the heart monitor beeping rapidly in time with the pulsing in his ears. "Ah," Astral gasped softly as they pulled back, zir head falling hard on the pillow. "That is—most certainly different with a physical form." Ze looked breathless and breathtaking, familiar and surprising, and Yuuma couldn't help but smile.   
\---  
Kaito insisted Astral stay in the medical bay overnight for observation and, with the help of the twins, forced Yuuma home after Astral fell into an exhausted sleep. Now Yuuma faced a new challenge, and he murmured a kattobing to himself as he opened the front door. 

Akari sat at the kitchen table nursing a steaming mug, and her eyes pinned him down as soon as he stepped in. "Where have you been? You were supposed to be back this morning!"

Yuuma guiltily remembered his plan not to return at all—okay, okay, Astral had been right about him not thinking it through. But he was back now and had something to talk about. "Sorry, something came up."

"Something came up, huh? No big deal, just something came up while you were in another dimension."

Yuuma no longer had to hide anything about his dueling life, no matter how supernatural, from his family—after his parents came back with the power of the Numeron Code, they'd all laid out their lives to each other, and after being angry for a while, Akari laughed about all the times she'd thought he was talking to himself. He hoped she could laugh now. 

"Well, yeah. And I need to talk to you about it."

That caught her attention. "I'll get you some coffee if it'll be a long talk."

Yuuma grinned. "Long enough."

He headed to the kitchen while she poured a second mug and topped hers off, grabbing the cream and sugar and meeting her back at the table. "So, talk," she prompted, watching while he spooned heaping measures of sugar in  and filled cream up to the rim of the mug. 

"Akari..." He hesitated, considering his approach, then got straight to the point. "Someone needs to come live with us."

He gulped down a mouthful while her eyes narrowed at him, and she said in a monotone, "You brought someone back from another dimension."

"I mean, not just any someone," he jumped in defensively. "Technically ze's lived here before, so it's really not a big deal, except you'll be able to see zim this time..." Yuuma trailed off under her penetrating stare. 

"The alien. You want the dueling alien to come live here."

"Astral," Yuuma corrected with a hint of annoyance; she'd been told all about zim. 

"Is the world ending again?" she asked with a sigh. "You know, either way, why would—ze," she said, stumbling on the pronoun for a moment before remembering, "need to stay here? There are plenty of other people more invested in interdimensional politics than grandma and me."

"Because it's not politics. And it's not even really interdimensional anymore."

Over their coffees, Yuuma recounted for the second time what transpired for Astral, again leaving off the touchy-feely bits, this time to avoid sibling teasing and because that probably wouldn't help his argument for Astral coming to stay with them. 

Akari heaved a sigh as the discussion wrapped up. "When are you going to stop causing trouble for me?"

"Hey!" he cried in protest, but she simply put her mug in the sink and picked up her D-gazer. 

"Get to bed, you. I have a call to make; we'll figure things out in the morning."  
\---  
Astral had not anticipated this. Ze tried to wrap zir head around what 'this' was, but honestly ze began to suspect ze hadn't anticipated anything. Well, no—ze had anticipated being visible to all, and being able to eat whenever ze wanted, and experiencing the human world the way ze did the astral world, perhaps even a little more intensely. What ze hadn't expected was the constant sensation, coming from within as well as without. Ze had understood forms as methods for interacting with the world, but there were millions of ways zir body interacted with itself, from the pulsing of blood through zir veins to the gurgling that ze felt in zir stomach and throat. Even stranger, the feeling of zir body being in space, a sensation ze couldn't begin to describe. Ze had faced incredible pain before, but never this ever-present sensation there was no meaningful response to. 

However, when ze woke to an empty room and sensations that told zim it was time to get up, there were many responses ze needed to make to zir sensations. For example, the feeling of weightlessness in zir middle when ze leaned out of the bed meant ze was falling. 

A more frazzled Kaito than Astral was used to seeing hurried in as ze was on all fours, testing different methods of getting upright. 

"This is rather more difficult than my observations led me to believe," Astral supplied as Kaito stared at zim. 

"Oh my god," he murmured under his breath, coming over to help Astral to zir feet. 

Ze found zimself staring at the ground, unable to look in Kaito's direction. Ze was concerned about zir visual capacities for a moment, before realizing that this was a bodily component of an emotion. Ah, yes: shame, embarrassment. "I apologize that I am not able to care for myself appropriately. I am sure I will not have to inconvenience you soon. I..." Ze trailed off, suddenly struck by the thought that perhaps this was not something ze could learn, perhaps ze would be stuck relying on others to care for a body ze couldn't pilot...

"What?" he asked in confusion. "No, you don't have anything to apologize for. You're already doing much better than last night." Astral felt a warmth spread over zim as he helped zim into a sitting position on the bed. "I've just been trying to figure out how this works. Your brain activity has been normalizing since last night, and you’re moving very well for someone who’s never had a body before. Based on the way the relationship between your experiences and your body was explained to me, I think you’re incorporating your experiences of your astral body into your human body. If so, you should be able to function normally soon.”

“I see,” Astral sighed, a certain tightness in zir chest receding.

“Now, let’s do something about the things we can.” Kaito was looking determinedly at the far wall. “Like getting you clothes.”

Astral looked down at zir fleshy naked body. “Oh.”

Kaito retrieved a t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants (his, ze assumed, but perhaps Haruto’s if he’d grown that much while ze was away) and left Astral to dress zimself. Ze’d seen Yuuma dress for school so many times that this, at least, ze knew how to do—but ze kept getting distracted by zir own body as ze tried to pull the clothes on.

First it was zir toes—ze’d never had toes before, and ze spent quite some time wiggling the stubby finger-like appendages. Then ze noticed the fine downy hair of zir legs, and found that it extended similarly across zir entire body. It was thicker in certain patches—the top of zir head, which was largely similar to zir previous form aside from textural differences; fuzzy lines above zir eyes, which ze belatedly realized were eyebrows, a feature ze hadn’t possessed before; patches at zir armpits, which seemed a strange place to grow hair, but then there were many things ze still didn’t understand about human bodies; the point between zir thighs where they met with zir hips.

Actually, now that ze looked there, quite a bit was different than zir previous form. Ze’d gathered that this general area of the body was used in emitting energy, so ze supposed that was what the changes were for. Zir area didn’t particularly look like Yuuma’s, zir only other point of reference, but then the comparison was only based on a glance ze’d caught once before he yelled at zir not to look while he was changing, and ze didn’t know what sorts of forms other humans might have.  

Ze next moved on to the soft skin of zir stomach, moving upwards to the darker nubs on zir chest that ze’d gathered all humans had. Well, as far as ze could tell, the only noticeable difference ze held with any of zir friends was a darker shade to zir skin, and that seemed a trivial difference. But zir interest in zir body was peaked now, so ze pulled on the clothes and, step by careful step, made it to the door and looked out for Kaito.

He was waiting just across the hall. “You making it okay?” he asked, eying zir carefully as if afraid ze might collapse, but not yet making any move to assist.

“I believe so,” ze replied, “though I think I could use something to balance myself with.”

At that, Kaito held out his arm and nodded down the hall. “Come on.”

Astral kept one hand on Kaito’s arm as they walked slowly down the hall. “Where are we going?”

“Breakfast,” he replied. 

Astral perked up. “Really? What are we eating?”

“I… don’t know,” Kaito replied, looking at zir strangely. “Whatever Orbital made. Probably whatever Haruto asked for.”

“Ah,” ze responded, trying to calm zir sudden excitement at the prospect of trying food again and focus on the question ze had. “I am curious about my new body—are there any results from the observations you have made that I should know?”

A strange expression came over his face. “You seem to be healthy. What did you want to know?”

“I am not sure—what do humans usually know about their bodies?”

Kaito furrowed his eyebrows. “Well, you’re 5’5” and 117 pounds, so you’re not quite underweight. Your features and skin color don’t look Japanese, but plenty of foreigners visit Heartland and some have immigrated, so that’s not a problem. Might even give an excuse for why you don’t know some things. Like I said, you’re healthy—all the scans showed normal body functions, except…” Kaito trailed off, casting a hesitant glance at Astral.

“Is there something wrong with me?” ze asked, a panicked sensation crawling in zir chest.

“No, nothing _wrong_. But the scans show that you, um, lack a reproductive system.”

That had certainly not occurred to Astral. Ze knew little enough about human reproduction—merely that it involved a male providing DNA to a female, and that the female would use the resultant merger in DNA to create a small human. It certainly didn’t seem like something ze needed to concern zirself with. “Does this reproductive system serve other functions?”

“No—well, yes, but you do seem to have the part that produces necessary hormones, and your hormone levels seem to be fine as well. So it’s not a problem to your health at all—just a, um, difference, something most humans have.”

“I see. Well, that does not seem to be a problem then.”

“Right,” Kaito replied, looking relieved. relationship between your experiences and your body was explained to me,

They entered through a doorway into a small dining area with a square table covered in food and four chairs. Orbital stood at one corner, pouring orange liquid into a glass for a boy with blue hair who looked close to the age that Yuuma had been when they’d met, but who Astral realized, with a jolt in zir chest, was Haruto.

Haruto jumped up from his chair in excitement, gripping the edge of the table and lifting his feet off the floor. “Astral! You’re wearing clothes!”

“Yes,” Astral affirmed. “I understand that to be the appropriate human custom.” Ze wasn’t sure how ze felt about that custom—the clothes produced new sensations with every movement, and left a constricting weight where they rested on zir body. They were, at least, comfortingly soft. “You are… much larger than when we last met.”

Haruto laughed. “I’m much stronger too!”

“He’s stayed in recovery since we defeated the Barians,” Kaito supplied, and Astral noticed the tender smile and warm look in his eyes when he looked at Haruto.

“And my brother’s been teaching me how to duel!” Haruto added. “Astral, will you duel me?”

“If Kaito has been teaching you, you will be a challenging adversary,” ze replied solemnly.

Haruto smiled like his face would break, but Kaito cut in with a warm scolding of “Breakfast first.”

Haruto pouted slightly, but Astral was perfectly happy with that directive—while ze did look forward to dueling the younger Tenjo brother, ze had been dueling for zir entire existence, and had as yet only tried food once. Haruto was happy to supply zim with the names and descriptions of all the available fare, as well as recommendations when ze appeared overwhelmed by the opportunity. First was the orange liquid—fittingly called orange juice. Ze was surprised by the tingling it set across zir tongue—tart, Haruto said—but after a second sip ze decided ze liked it. Next was a piece of toast that Haruto instructed zim to cut into four pieces and slathered with four different samplings—butter, cream cheese, and two jellies, grape and strawberry. Ze enjoyed them all, and when Haruto pressed zim for a favorite chose cream cheese, but wasn’t at all sure that would remain decided.

Haruto continued to ply Astral with food, telling Orbital to fetch new samples once everything on the table had been tried and watching Astral with scientific curiosity with every bite, and Astral was a willing test subject. Emboldened by their success, Astral asked Kaito for a sip of the hot black stuff he drank. Haruto warned it was bitter, and Astral replied that ze had no concept of that but intended to soon. Ze regretted that choice immediately—it was a burning disgust at the back of zir tongue that made zim gag, and Kaito, chuckling, took back the mug and offered zim another piece of toasts to get rid of the taste.

“When will Yuuma return?” ze asked after ze’d recovered from the taste.

“I sent him home last night to rest and check in with his family,” Kaito replied, stacking dirty dishes for Orbital to take away. “I’ll call him later, if you don’t mind. It’s still early.”

Astral was still nodding when Haruto gripped zir arm and started leading zim down the hallway. “We’ll duel until then!” he called back to his elder brother, and Astral followed with a smile.


	4. Chapter 4

Word spread quickly that night. Kotori got the news first-hand from Rio, and in telling the former Numbers Club that Yuuma and the twins were back safe, she couldn’t very well leave out that Astral was as well. And when Rio and Shark returned home that night (to the house the former Barians shared while preparing for a human adulthood), they could hardly fail to share what happened to them, though they tried to keep it to a need-to-know basis and avoid gossiping. But when Shark, Rio, and Durbe were alone in the living room, Shark couldn’t keep himself from divulging what an idiot Yuuma was and that _they tried to_ _run away together, can you even believe that, what are those two idiots going to do now,_ but they all fell silent when they heard the door to Vector’s room slam shut.

\---

Yuuma hadn’t even made it up to his hammock, instead collapsing on his bed as soon as he’d pulled his clothes off. He woke with a start in the morning, confused for a moment as he tried to gather what had happened in his life before sleep. As awareness rushed back into him, he leapt off the bed and threw on fresh clothes as he rushed downstairs. Astral would be awake, Astral would be okay, Astral…

“Yuuma!”

Akari’s voice halted his progress to the door. “What?” he half-whined, then remembered their conversation the night before. “Oh, um, so about—“

“Bring ‘im over.”

“H-huh?”

“The alien—Astral,” she corrected herself as she saw the pout forming on his face, “can come over.” He smiled, starting to issue his thanks, but she continued over him. “I called Mom and Dad. They’re coming home, but said to go ahead and let Astral stay until they get back.”

“They—they’re what?” he gasped. Their parents coming home mid-adventure was unheard of! His shock was then slightly attenuated by frustration. “What did you call them for?”

“Because they know something about this interdimensional crap, so they know how to keep you out of trouble.”

“I’m not a kid, I don’t need you keeping me out of trouble!”

“Sounds like something a kid would say,” she retorted.

Yuuma opened his mouth, stopped, and scowled.

“Go on,” she told him, waving her hand at the door. “It’s not gonna change—honestly, Dad sounded more excited about hearing about what happened.”

Yuuma hesitated, then resigned himself to the family intervention.

\---

Kaito intercepted him the moment he reached the main floor of Heartland Tower. “What the fuck, Yuuma?”

“What did I do now?” Yuuma demanded. He’d about had it with being scolded. “I went home! I slept! I did what you told me to!”

“You told Astral that ze would _die_ if anyone saw zim going to the bathroom?”

“I what…” Yuuma trailed off, memory surfacing. “ _Oooh_.”

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

“I was thirteen and ze wouldn’t let me take a dump in peace!” he defended himself. “Lay off!” Kaito continued glaring at him, and he finally broke eye-contact, rounding his shoulders defensively. “Was it that big of a deal?”

“Haruto managed to talk zim through it,” Kaito sighed. “He’s with zim now.”

“Great, I owe him one!” Yuuma beamed, taking off quickly down the hall. Kaito kept pace with him, and they both arrived at Haruto’s room to find him and Astral sprawled out on a rug, cards strewn between them.

Astral looked up into Yuuma’s eyes and broke into a wide smile. “Yuuma! Haruto has been showing me his deck. We were going to duel, but I am unsure how to retrieve my deck.”

Yuuma kneeled down between them, giving the younger boy a quick hug while he tried to get his breath under control. How long would it take before he was used to finding Astral’s eyes on him again? Would he ever get over how Astral said his name, with the accompanying breathiness behind it?

“Well, I’m sure if I can manage to shining draw on my own, you’ll figure out how to get your deck,” he said, smiling at zim unsteadily.

Luckily, Astral didn’t seem to notice. “I am sure you are correct. I certainly have enough to figure out as it is.” Ze suddenly frowned. “Like figuring out what else you lied to me about.”

Yuuma devolved into protests that left Haruto in stitches on the floor, until Yuuma figured out that Astral was teasing him and fell silent in a huff. When Astral went back to discussing deck strategies with Haruto, however, he quickly gave up on that tactic and tried to direct zir attention back to him.

“If you feel well enough, we can go back to my house whenever. You’re gonna be staying there again.”

“I am still a bit unsteady, but Kaito says I am healthy.” Astral gave a contented smile. “I have missed your house.”

Yuuma could hardly contain the warmth spreading through his chest. “Let’s go then!”

He felt Kaito’s hand fall on his shoulder. “Astral, why don’t you finish helping Haruto before you go?”

“Of course,” Astral replied, turning and smiling at the boy, who grinned back.

Kaito tugged on Yuuma’s shoulder and guided him up. “What’s,” he began, but halted when Kaito shot him a meaningful glance.

Once they stepped out into the hallway, Kaito gave him a critical stare and asked, “Do you know what you’re doing?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Exactly what I said. I want to know if you know what you’re doing.” When Yuuma didn’t respond, Kaito glanced back at Astral and added, “I saw zim kiss you.”

Yuuma felt himself flush—he’d been so wrapped up in seeing Astral _here_ and _safe_ , he’d forgotten to be embarrassed about his friends seeing them. “Well, I mean, it’s, um…”

“I don’t give a damn about your personal life, Yuuma,” Kaito interrupted. “I just want to make sure that you two have at least some idea of what you’re getting into.”

Finally, Yuuma paused. What exactly were they getting into? They loved each other: they’d both said it, and Yuuma was quite sure they understood each other’s feelings. He’d kissed Astral, and apparently Astral liked that, which was good, because more of that was definitely something he wanted to get into. And Astral was coming to live with him… That had seemed so obvious to Yuuma, a continuation of the interrupted life they had shared years ago, but when he took a step back and thought about it in the context of their current relationship, the implications…

He looked back at Astral, placing the last few cards in separate piles, pointing to one and explaining something to a rapt Haruto (he certainly listened better than Yuuma had at his age), and a sense of peace and contentedness settled into his chest. Meeting Kaito’s stare, he said, “Astral is finally going to get a chance to live. The rest, well… we’ll figure it out.”

Kaito nodded. “Alright. I just need you to promise me something.”

“What?”

“Do _not_ come to me with your relationship problems.” Yuuma laughed, but Kaito continued with a penetrating stare. “I’m serious. I do not want to hear _anything_ about it.”

“Okay, okay!”

“I will deal with your interdimensional problems, but if I have to deal with your relationship bullshit…”

“I get it! Jeez!” Yuuma huffed as Astral and Haruto approached.

“You get what?” Astral asked.

“Nothing,” Yuuma and Kaito responded in unison. Yuuma noticed Haruto give his brother a skeptical look, but Astral seemed more focused on putting one foot in front of the other.

Yuuma cleared his throat. “Well, let’s go home!”

Astral smiled, nodding. Ze reached zir hand toward Yuuma and took another step forward; when one leg gave out from under zim, ze wound up with Yuuma clutching zir extended arm, Kaito gripping the other, and Haruto propping zim up with his hands on zir back.

After a flash of surprise, Astral smiled apologetically at Yuuma. “Kaito says that should be temporary.”

Yuuma gave a brief chuckled of relief and pulled Astral to him, wrapping an arm around zir back.

\---

Kaito dropped them off at Yuuma’s house, Haruto waving at them from the front seat as he pulled away (once Haruto was healthy enough to attend school, Orbital couldn’t serve as their sole means of transportation). A strange expression crossed Astral’s face as they stood looking at the house, Yuuma still steadying zim with one arm.

“It has been a long time,” ze said, tenderness suffusing zir voice.

“Well don’t make it any longer!” Yuuma chided with a smile, dragging zim up the steps and opening the front door.

“ASTRAL!”

The piercing shriek came as Kotori moved in a flurry from the couch to fling her arms around zim. Astral, barely able to support zir own weight, stumbled back into Yuuma, who gripped the doorframe with both hands to keep from toppling.

“Oh my god, Astral, you look so different! I mean, not _so_ different, I guess, I knew it was you, but I mean—wow! You’re brown! And all your markings are gone!” She held zim at arm’s length, looking zim over before meeting zir eyes with a radiant smile. “You look amazing.”

Yuuma managed to steady the two of them and sidle around, one hand still resting on Astral’s back as he saw zim give a small smile that nevertheless spread into zir eyes. “Kotori. I… have missed you.”

“Oh,” she wailed, burying her face in zir shoulder again. “I know, it’s been forever since I visited! It’s just, I never really did anything, and school got so busy… oh, that’s a terrible excuse!”

“There is no need to apologize,” ze said, supporting zimself on her shoulders. “Nevertheless, it is always good to see you.”

Steps sounded down the stairs. “Kotori, was that you? Is Yuuma ba…” Akari trailed off when she saw the trio at the door. “Oh.” She slowly descended the rest of the steps, staring at the one face she didn’t know. “You… you must be Astral.”

“Hello Akari,” Astral greeted her as Kotori released zim.

She grimaced briefly at her name, but recovered and made her way into the room. “Why don’t you all have a seat?” She addressed Astral directly with, “I’d show you around, but I guess you’re already familiar.”

As Yuuma and Kotori helped zim onto the couch, ze replied, “Yes, I remember the layout of your home. However, I am sure I will need Yuuma’s help to navigate living here.”

“Yeah, you’re new to being… physical,” she said slowly. “So, why is it you’ve decided to stay here? Just want a, um, familiar space?”

“Well, I do have fond memories of this house,” ze replied with a slight smile. “But I would stay wherever Yuuma is.”

Yuuma felt a bubbling in his chest of mixed pleasure and embarrassment. He was about to cut in with something to divert the conversation, but before he could Akari laughed. “Are you sure you can stand being around him for so long?”

Astral tilted zir head in confusion. “I intend to be with Yuuma for the rest of our lives. I love him.”

Yuuma felt his cheeks slowly ignite as all eyes turned to Astral. Ze looked around at each of them in further confusion, finally landing on Yuuma (he wanted to look away, but if he did he might have to meet Akari or Kotori’s gaze). “Is that not what the love we spoke of includes?” ze asked.

Akari stood abruptly. “Yuuma, I need to talk to you for a minute.”

Yuuma braced himself while she dragged him to the kitchen and out of sight. “Yuuma,” she growled, keeping her voice low, “you didn’t tell me you were _dating_ the alien when you asked for zim to come live here.”

He fidgeted uncomfortably. “Well, I mean, we’re not technically dating…” They’d yet to discuss what their relationship was, exactly, but it surely couldn’t be summed up with such a flippant word.

Akari rolled her eyes. “Please, ze just said…” She trailed off, eyes suddenly widening in horror. “Yuuma, did you fuck the alien?”

“What? No!” he yelped, belatedly remembering to keep his voice down, but she continued.

“Oh my god, tell me this didn’t happen when you were thirteen!”

“Akari, I did _not_ fuck the alien!” he hissed, grabbing her arms and forcing their faces together.

They broke eye-contact as they heard Kotori induce a coughing fit from the living room. “Go on, I’ll get lunch out,” she muttered. As he headed back to the living room, she added, “I swear Yuuma, if Grandma sees something and you give her a heart attack…”

“Oh my god, Akari!” he hissed back, fleeing from the kitchen.

Both pairs of eyes met him as he reentered, Kotori shooting him a disbelieving look as Astral asked innocently, “Is something wrong?”

“N-no!” he stammered, smiling and sitting on Astral’s other side. “Akari just, um, needed help remembering where Grandma put the leftovers for lunch!” Ze looked doubtful, but Yuuma followed up with, “She made duel rice, you remember that, right?”

Zir eyes lit up. “Oh, yes!” Ze stood, a little too quickly, stumbling, but righted zimself as Akari set a platter of rice balls on the table and plopped into a chair.

Kotori grabbed Astral’s elbow, as if to steady zim, and guided zim to a place diagonal to Akari, herself taking the seat across from her. Yuuma moved to join them, but Kotori caught his eye and jerked her head subtly towards Akari. He pouted, realizing that she was trying to shield the interdimensional being from the one who clearly had no patience for, as she put it, “interdimensional crap,” and that he’d have to be part of that shield. However, the fear that she might interrogate Astral next sent him to the other side of the table and into the chair beside her.

Luckily, she didn’t say much; none of them did, actually. As soon as Astral took a bite of the rice ball, ze let out a moan, with “This is even better than I remember!” buried somewhere within, and continued making appreciative noises as ze finished the first and reached for another.

Yuuma could feel Akari eyeing him over her lunch, but he stared determinedly at his own rice, doing his damnedest to keep a blush off his face as Astral’s noises continued. When he finished the first, he immediately grabbed another, keeping his mouth occupied with food so she couldn’t ask him something horrible, like if he was used to hearing these noises, or… oh god…

When she finished her lunch and grabbed her jacket, announcing she had an interview to conduct downtown, he felt the tension drain from his shoulders. He looked up with a satisfied sigh as the door closed behind her, eyes falling on the empty platter in the middle of the table, then on Astral, a half-eaten duel rice in zir hand. “Astral, how many have you had?”

“Fibe,” Astral replied, then covered zir mouth and swallowed. “And a half.”

“Five? Astral, you can’t eat that much!”

“Why not? I am still enjoying eating them.” Ze looked around the table. “Did I take someone else’s share? If so, I apologize.”

“No, but there’s a limit to how much you can eat at once! Jeez, even I feel sick after four!”

“Sick?” ze asked. “Now that you mention it, I feel a pain in my abdomen. I thought such feelings indicated hunger.”

Yuuma sighed. “There are a lot of types of stomach pain, Astral. If you feel it while you’re eating, you probably need to stop.”

“Ah,” Astral replied, voice growing fainter as ze clutched zir stomach. “I will keep that in mind from now o…”

Kotori reacted quickly, grabbing the kitchen trashcan and pushing Astral’s head over it as ze heaved. Yuuma jumped up and ran to the other side of the table, patting zir back as ze gagged and coughed. “Wh-what is this?” ze panted frantically. “Am I dying?”

“No!” Yuuma tried to comfort zim, but it came out embedded in a hysterical laugh. “You just threw up!”

“Wh-why are you laughing?” ze gasped, spitting into the trashcan.

“I’m sorry, I just…” He took a deep breath, trying to get his laughter under control. “I just didn’t imagine this would be a problem, you not knowing how to eat…” He trailed off, choking back the giggles in his throat.

“This can just happen when you get sick,” Kotori told zim, shooting a glare at Yuuma over zir back, but he could tell her lips were fighting a smile. He shook his head, swallowing his laughter while he wiped the spittle from zir lips with a napkin.

“This is awful,” Astral groaned.

“You’ll feel better soon,” he assured zim. “Come on, let’s get you to bed.” He heaved zim up despite zir groans, Kotori taking zir other side to steady zim as they climbed the stairs.

They made it to Yuuma’s room and deposited zim gently on the bed, Yuuma pulling the covers up to zir waist. “Just lay down and relax,” he told zim, brushing hair back from zir forehead.

“Mmm,” ze moaned in reply, squeezing zir eyes shut.

Yuuma and Kotori exchanged helpless smiles and sneaked downstairs, leaving zim to sleep off zir misadventure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I tried to have some funnies, as well as the first hints of major drama, so I hope you enjoyed it. 
> 
> Hopefully my characterization of Akari didn't come off too negative, I just see her as a "stares into the void and the void blinks first" sort of person, so that's how I tried to portray her. 
> 
> As always, I love-love-love any feedback, so feel free to contact me in any way you know how if you want to say something! (I mean, if I find a note taped to my door I'd be a little worried, but still flattered.) Thanks!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Augh, I'm sorry, I know this is way late. Thanks so much to everyone who's talked to me about it in the interim, you're fantastic! I actually have a lot more written, just not in order... which is to say, don't worry about me giving up, there's a lot coming once I can figure out where to put it! Thank you so much for sticking with me!

“Are you sure it’s okay for all of us to come over?” Rio asked the digital images and Yuuma and Kotori.

“Yeah, it’s fine!” Yuuma assured her. “Akari and Grandma are gone, so it won’t be too crowded for them. Astral's napping right now, but I’m sure ze’ll want to see you all soon!”

Rio wasn’t so sure about the “all” part, but left her doubts unvoiced as she finished gathering her things and the other former Barians trickled into the living room one at a time. “We ready?” she asked, knowing full well that Vector hadn’t left his room, but then he hadn’t confirmed he was going with them on this visit, so maybe they could just head out now and—

“Ooh~, is it time to see the lovebirds?”

She looked to Ryouga as they both cringed. So much for escaping.

“Love… birds…?” Mizael asked, sounding each word he’d never heard either before.

“Yuuma and Kotori aren’t dating again, are they?” Alit asked quickly, expression suddenly thoughtful. “Would that help or hurt my chances of…”

Vector laughed, throwing his head back in his usual cackle. “Oh, it definitely hurts your chances. Last I remember, Astral was rather _possessive_ of him, excuse the pun.”

“Yuuma and… Astral?” Gilag asked skeptically.

“Yep~!” Vector chimed in delight. “Astral came _down_ from heaven just so ze could come _in_ Yu—“

“ _Vector_!”

Vector paused, turning to take in Ryouga’s balled fists and clenched teeth. “Eeeh~?”

“We’re going,” he growled, yanking the front door open harder than strictly necessary.

“Goody!” he chirped, following Ryouga out passed a crowd of raised eyebrows. Rio sighed as she followed them, now really wishing that Yuuma had reconsidered his “all.”

\---

Astral woke to voices downstairs. Ze couldn’t pick them out, muffled as they were through the floor, but ze was sure there were more than Yuuma and Kotori. Ze sat up, feeling the covers of Yuuma’s bed slide off zim. Yes, quite a crowd of voices, talking rather loudly, with the unmistakable tone of Yuuma with his friends.   

Ze stood slowly, still not used to this sleeping-and-waking cycle. Ze knew that ze had been simply laying on Yuuma’s bed, but ze had no memory of being there between Yuuma and Kotori leaving zim there and now. Indeed, ze had the faint, confusing sensation that ze had been somewhere else entirely.

A more pressing sensation was the one in zir mouth, a burning sort of feeling reminiscent of Kaito’s disgusting beverage. Ze pondered what this could mean, finally recalling the mouth-cleaning ritual Yuuma performed every morning and night. Teeth-brushing? Yes, that was it, ze needed to brush zir teeth.

Ze made zir way to the adjacent bathroom, proud of being able to reach it almost without leaning on the walls for support. There ze found a toothbrush and toothpaste, and tried to imitate the motions ze had watched Yuuma perform in the past. Ze considered it a success: the burning was replaced by a slightly confusing coolness, and ze only had to wash a few clumps of paste off zir nose and cheeks. Human hygiene needs managed for now, ze gripped the handrail as ze carefully descended the stairs.

A roar of greeting rang from Alit and Gilag as ze came into view, drowning out the more measured greetings ze saw the others making. Ze had seen them all on occasion since reviving them, of course, and as Yuuma jumped up to help zim down the stairs, they treated zim largely the same as ever. Gilag and Alit were loud, the latter rather more energetic; Durbe was polite, a mixture of friendliness and formality; Mizael made a snide remark about zim getting to see how ze forced them to live, but he did so with a playful smirk. Shark and Rio hung back, having just seen zim yesterday, and ze appreciated the slightly smaller crowd that left around zim.

There was one other missing, of course. As Yuuma helped zim to the couch, ze saw Vector lounging on the floor across from them, cold eyes digging into Astral’s. When Astral returned his gaze, he gave a sharp grin and turned away.

“Durbe was just talking about getting you into school!” Yuuma chimed, drawing zir attention away from the former Barian on the floor.

“School?” Astral asked, taken aback. “Will that be necessary?”

“Well, sure, everybody needs to go to school. What else would you do?”

Ze thought that figuring out how to eat appropriately was currently a high priority, but merely said, “I suppose you are right.”

“I still have the documents Kaito used to get us into the system, so it shouldn’t be hard to do the same for you,” Durbe said. “I suppose you’ll want to be in the same class as Yuuma?”

“Yes,” ze answered quickly.

Durbe nodded. “We all started in middle school, but high school should be doable. You’ll just have some catching up to do.”

Something else to be behind in. “Are you all in high school also?”

“Me and Mizael graduated last year!” Gilag announced, proud smile on his face. “I have a job now, and Mizael’s going to university.”

“Ecology,” Mizael added, expression intense. “Did you know that humans are _still_ driving other species _extinct_?”

“Thomas—you know, IV—graduated with them, and—oh crap, did anyone tell them about Astral?” Yuuma demanded, derailing himself in concern.

“I told Michael earlier, I’m sure he told his brothers,” Kotori sighed. “Everyone else wants to visit too, but I told them not to overwhelm you too much at first,” she added to Astral.

Ze nodded; ze was already thoroughly overwhelmed.

“Shark, Rio, and Durbe are a year ahead of us, but everyone else is with us,” Yuuma continued now that he knew his forgetfulness had been covered.

Everyone—that meant the old Numbers Club, of course, and Michael, and the remaining former Barians. Zir eyes swept the room, mulling over who was unaccounted for, fixing first on Alit, then on—

Vector was returning zir gaze with a smile, and now he spoke for the first time. “It’s so fun, all of us being together. I’m so glad you’re going to join us, Astral-kun~.”

He was being Shingetsu, then. Ze was actually disappointed. When he was Vector, at least ze and Yuuma felt largely the same way about him. But he hadn’t pulled any large-scale betrayals in the past four years, so ze figured whatever human-level tricks and manipulations he pulled were fine.   

“Just don’t make zim join in on your shortcuts, ze has enough trouble walking right now as it is,” Yuuma chided.

Vector laughed. “Can’t even walk and already sweeping him off his feet.” He leaned towards Astral, hands gripping his knees.  “What’s your secret?”

Astral blinked at him. Secret? Sweeping? “I do not…”

“Come on, don’t be shy!” The rest of the room had gone oddly quiet as he smiled conspiratorially at Astral. “Let me guess—get ‘em when they’re young so they can’t give anyone else a chance?”

“Hey, what the hell is that supposed to mean?” Yuuma demanded, leaning into the space between zim and Vector. “I gave everyone a chance!”

Vector giggled, rolling back on his heels. “That makes you sound like a slut.”

Yuuma scowled. “Well, not enough of a slut for you, apparently, even when you did keep asking me.”

“Hey, no need to be mean, Yuuma-kun,” Vector pouted. “That’s the reason you got your date with Shark.” He made a monstrous face, tongue lolling. “He had to protect your precious virginity.”

Yuuma played along, throwing a hand palm-up onto his forehead. “Shark, help me! Shingetsu is being a dirty pervert!” He fell from the couch onto Vector and they both dissolved into laughter.

“It was not a fucking date!” Shark barked from an armchair across from them, fuming.

“We did dinner and a movie,” Yuuma retorted, sitting back up as he recovered himself.

“You… you do that with friends all the time!” Shark sputtered.

“Sure, sure,” Yuuma shrugged. “But _that time_ it was a date.”

Shark growled and flung a cushion at Yuuma; it caught him in the face and landed hard in Vector’s gut. Alit gave a whistle between his fingers. “Whoo, double KO!”

Kotori cleared her throat. “Weren’t we talking about Astral going to school, Yuuma?”

“Oh, right,” he chuckled, scratching the back of his head sheepishly as he plopped back down on the couch.

From there, the conversation turned to preparing Astral for school: which classes ze could probably pick up on and which ze’d need to catch up on beforehand, what information would have to be fabricated for school records (ze settled on yesterday, the day ze obtained zir body, as zir birthday; ze agreed to think about a place of origin and a family name, after zir suggestion that ze just take Yuuma’s was shot down with a mixture of embarrassment from Yuuma, laughter from the others, and horror all around). Though ze somehow missed the beginning of the topic, Kotori was talking excitedly about bringing over her uniform for zim to try on alongside Yuuma’s to decide which ze wanted. Ze tried to stay engaged in the conversations flying around zim, because ze knew they were for zir benefit, but other thoughts kept intruding. Occasionally ze would steal a glance at Vector; he’d fallen silent, watching the conversations unfold placidly, like he was watching a ball being tossed. Still, ze couldn’t help but feel that he was appraising zim.  

Eventually, Kotori remarked that she had to be home to help with dinner, and Rio and Shark insisted (over Alit and Vector’s protests) that they wouldn’t impose. After everyone departed, Yuuma gave a contented sigh and stretched out on the couch. “Akari shouldn’t be back for a little while yet,” he said, tilting his head backward over the couch to look at the clock on the wall. “And grandma won’t be back from her trip until tomorrow. Guess we’ve got the place to ourselves for a bit.” He blushed a bit as he said this, combing his fingers through his hair restlessly.

However, Astral was too wrapped in zir own thoughts to be bothered much by any of Yuuma’s occasional oddities. “May I ask you something?”

He sat up straighter, twisting to face zim. “Sure, what’s up?”

"I am curious… why did you date so many people, if you did not wish to have relationships with them?"

"Oh, well, I wanted to be sure.” He chewed his lip, drumming his fingers as he searched for his next words. “I did like everybody I tried to date. And I wasn't sure what all those feelings I had were. But when I tried, well, nothing compared."

Astral tilted zir head. "To what?"

"To you. To what I felt for you.” He gave a grin of embarrassment. “I mean, I knew I liked you, but you were gone. Not totally gone, but…” He trailed off and shook his head. “So I tried to see if I could feel that for other people, but nothing else came close." He smiled sheepishly. "So I figured, well, no sense in trying to force something if it just isn’t going to be the same."

“I see.” When Yuuma continued to look at zim expectantly, ze added, "I do not mind that you did." This was not entirely true. The thought of Yuuma with anyone else in the special way they shared, even briefly, left a sickly burning sensation in zir throat and a red pounding under zir skin. But ze knew that Yuuma was under no obligation to zim, especially when they'd parted ways and ze insisted ze was gone for good. And, ze admitted to zimself guiltily, it felt good to have the comparison: to know that no one else could give Yuuma these feelings, that ze could do something special to him. Ze, of course, didn't need the comparison. It wasn’t just that zir life wouldn’t be the same without Yuuma; ze wouldn’t even have one.

“Is that all you wanted to ask?”

“Yes, I—well, no,” ze corrected.  "You said that your feelings are different for me than when you dated others. Are we 'dating'?"

He laughed. "Well, I'm not sure exactly. I think of us as really different from just dating, but I'm not sure what that means. Do you want to talk about it?"

"Yes. I think I would like to know the nature of our relationship. I know that I love you and wish to stay with you, but I am unsure what that entails for human relations."

He brought his legs up onto the couch, crossing them and resting his hands on his knees as he faced Astral (ze couldn’t help but smile as ze recognized his focused pose). "Ok, well I'd say we're in a romantic relationship for sure. That means our relationship is different than friendships, because of the feelings we have that we don't have for our friends."

"Yes, that sounds right."

"It seems like we both want to commit to this relationship. We want this to last."

"Yes, forever," ze replied, and Yuuma's face burned a bright red.

"R-right. And we’ll probably want to be monogamous, at least for now..."

"Monogamous?"

"It means we only have a romantic relationship with each other and no one else. I don't have feelings for anyone else, and I figured we should at least get comfortable being with each other before we-"

"I like monogamy," ze cut in hurriedly, and Yuuma snorted.

"I figured you would. So, we're in a committed, monogamous, romantic relationship.” He gave a cheeky grin that took over his face as he added, “I guess I'm your boyfriend."

“My boyfriend,” Astral repeated, trying the word out on zir tongue. Ze remembered hearing it before, but ze’d never imagined it would be relevant. It left a tingling in zir chest ze couldn’t name. “And what am I to you?”  

"Hm, there are some words other than boyfriend and girlfriend for people who aren’t either, but I’d have to look them up. I mean, you _could_ use either of those if you wanted to. And there’s partner, significant other, lover..."

"Lover?"

"Oh god, please don't use that one, it'd be so embarrassing. It has... implications."

"It sounds very accurate. I love you, so I am your lover, yes? Well, I have been your partner for a long time. I am happy to continue that. What else is involved in being romantic partners?"

"Whatever we want,” he answered with a shrug. “Those were the main relationship specifics to work out."

"I feel like it is not so simple. Are you sure you know what you are talking about?"

"What is that supposed to mean?" Yuuma huffed.

Astral leaned in. "And the kissing, that is part of it too, yes?"

Yuuma gulped. "If... If we both want it to be, yeah."

"I see. And do you?" He gave a tiny nod before Astral covered his lips in the gentlest of lingering kisses. As ze pulled back, he gave dizzy sigh. “Are you alright?”

“Mm,” he mumbled, eyes hazy and a smile dancing on his lips. He reached out, brushing his fingers through zir hair as he had when they were alone in that bridge dimension—the last time they’d been alone together, amazing—and though it felt quite different now, the look in his eyes was the same, and ze found zimself leaning into the caress until zir face was nestled in the crook of his neck, and he had an arm wrapped around zir shoulders, hand still brushing gently at the hair along zir brow.

Time became a bit strange, so ze wasn’t sure how long they sat like that, hypnotized by the feel of Yuuma’s fingertips and the scent coming off his skin—scent, ze’d never had that before, but already ze was grateful for it. But suddenly there came the sound of stomping feet at the door, and ze was knocked back into awareness as Yuuma shoved zim off and jumped up as Akari came through the door.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for some sexuality themes (not sexual content), if that makes you squeamish (can I say squick? Do people still say that?)  
> Thanks for reading!

As Akari narrowed her eyes at him, Yuuma knew he had made a mistake. He glanced back at Astral, laying prone on the couch when he shoved zim, and back at Akari. _Shit_.

“I brought takeout,” she said in a slow monotone, lifting the bag in one hand.

“Great!” he exclaimed too loudly, wincing at himself behind his wide grin.

She walked toward the kitchen, throwing an arm around his shoulders and hissing under her breath as she dragged him along. “On the couch, Yuuma? Really? You have a perfectly good bed and a door with a lock. God damn, this is exactly what I was worried about.”

“It’s not what it looks like!” he hissed back as she set the bag on the table.

“What looks like what?”

They both jumped; Astral had risen and padded silently behind them.

“Nothing!” Yuuma insisted. “Nothing looks like anything!”

Astral looked thoroughly confused by his outburst, glancing between him and Akari, who Yuuma could still feel glaring at him. “Have I caused a problem?”

Yuuma’s stomach twisted, but Akari replied with a “No,” and a sigh.

There was an extended silence while they emptied the bag and sorted through the dishes. Astral had lowered zimself into the nearest chair at the table and began eating as soon as he handed zim a plate—ze must be hungry after losing zir lunch earlier, Yuuma thought, but he did notice ze was eating much slower, and kept glancing at him occasionally as if waiting for him to tell zim to stop. He gave an encouraging grin.

“So,” Akari said slowly from where she leaned against the counter, eating her food out of the carton and eyeing Astral. “What are you going to do when Yuuma’s break ends and he goes back to school?”

“It seems I will be joining him at school. I am unsure what all my life here will involve, but Yuuma believes that to be a good place to start.”

“Right. Usually you just, uh, play cards and save the world, huh.”

“That is the purpose for which I was created. I am excited to learn what else I may do.”

“The purpose… I’m sorry, ‘for which you were created’?”

“Yes, I was formed to protect Astral World. Being with Yuuma was the first time I had experiences outside of this. Now, living my own life… I never planned for this opportunity. So I am not yet sure what to do with it.”

Akari looked horrified.

Astral turned back to Yuuma. “Oh, I think I am sensing that full feeling. Did I eat an appropriate amount of food?”

Yuuma looked at zir plate and into the original dish to compare what was left. “Yeah, if you’re feeling full go ahead and stop.”

“Very well. I think I also need to use the bathroom.”

Yuuma watched as Akari’s eyes followed Astral across the room, then snapped back to him. “Oh my god, Yuuma, ze doesn’t know anything.”

“That’s rude,” he replied, taking another bite.

“But… like… holy shit!” she continued, dropping the carton on the counter and falling into a chair. After another second of stunned silence, she turned to him with wide eyes. “You can’t sleep with zim. Ze probably doesn’t even know what that is.”

“Probably not,” he agreed, though he hadn’t thought of it before; it seemed both very funny and a little worrisome. “Now will you stop accusing me of it?”

They both suddenly became interested in their food again when they heard the bathroom door open. Akari took one last bite and dropped the carton in the trash. “I’ve got to write up that interview. Let me know if you need anything.” She spared a smile for Astral as ze reentered the kitchen, before retreating to her office.

“I am confused,” Astral voiced once her door closed behind her. “Does she… dislike me?”

“No, no!” he assured zim. “It’s just taking her a little bit to get used to you. You know, someone new coming into the house…”

“I do not know, but alright,” ze conceded.

“How are you feeling? You tired, or is that nap still keeping you going?”

“I am not yet tired. I noticed the tub in the bathroom—may I use it?”

“You want to take a bath?” Yuuma asked, caught off guard.

Astral nodded. “It is one of the feelings I often wondered about. It seems curious to submerge one’s body into liquid. And it is a necessary part of human hygiene, is it not?”

“Yeah. I’ll show you how it works if you want one.”

Once in the bathroom, Yuuma explained the taps and adjusted them to his preferred temperature, gesturing Astral to put zir hand in. "How's that?" 

Ze gave a small yelp. "It's warm!"

He laughed. "Yeah, it's supposed to be. Does it feel alright?"

Ze put zir hand back in experimentally, finally replying, "Yes."

Letting the tub fill, Yuuma turned to the linen closet to find zim a towel and washcloth, explaining the different soaps as he went. "And make sure not to get any of them in your eyes, it'll—ahh!" he broke off, dropping the towel as he turned to see Astral naked. 

"What?" ze asked, startled, but Yuuma couldn't control his voice. He couldn't seem to control his eyes, either, as he took in what seemed like miles of smooth, dark skin, from zir slender neck to the subtle ridges of zir ribs to...

The drift of his eyes juxtaposed with his last conversation with Akari finally jolted him back into control. He squeezed his eyes shut, shaking his head violently. "Astral, you can't just take your clothes off!"

"But that is necessary for a bath, is it not?"

"Wait until I'm gone!"

"But I thought you were going to help me."

"I didn't think you meant help with that part! Cover up!"

"What needs covering?"

"Augh, just get in the bath!" He turned his head but opened his eyes enough to make out zir form in his periphery, lending a hand to help zim into the tub and turning the taps off. Now that zir waist and below was underwater, it was easier to keep his eyes focused on appropriate places. He found zir arms crossed over zir chest and the disinterested expression on zir face that meant ze was offended. "What's wrong?"

Astral’s eyes darted to him before turning away again. "You have never been bothered by my lack of clothing before."

He gave an exasperated sigh. "Astral, you didn't have a body then!"

"I did not realize that having a body entailed others being disgusted by it."

"What—I'm not—that's not what's happening at all!" Yuuma sputtered. "I love your body, I just..."

"You do?" ze asked, eyes swinging to him in sudden intrigue. 

"Yeah, I mean, I get to kiss you and hold you and..." Yuuma felt his face burning and his voice starting to stammer. "Look, can we just deal with one thing at a time?"

"Very well," ze responded, laying zir head back against the tub. "This feels very pleasant, I was right about trying this."

"Ugh," Yuuma groaned, tossing the washcloth in the tub and splashing zir face. "You're the worst."

Astral blew water off zir lips and replied rather unapologetically, "My apologies." 

He sighed, sliding down to the floor to lean on the tub. "Put your head under, you need to get your hair wet. Oh, and don't breathe when you're under water, plug your nose, close your eyes, uh..."

Yuuma was still trying to think of anything else ze'd need to know that he took for granted when he heard a splash followed by the sound of Astral surfacing. "And now?"

He turned, his annoyance unable to keep him from admiring how zir wet hair clung to zir cheeks and neck. "Shampoo."

Ze reached uncertainly. "No, to your right—too far—the blue one—yeah, that one. Put it in your hair."

Ze fiddled with it, managed to open the cap, considered it for a moment, then lifted it over zir head and squeezed. Some landed on the crown of zir head, but considerably more hit the wall behind zim. 

"No, you have to put it in your hand—ugh, just let me do it." He took the bottle out of zir hands and poured some onto his palms. 

"I did ask you for help," Astral muttered crossly. "And you never really let me watch you bathe, so it is not as if I have a point of reference."

"Maybe if you weren't so interested in seeing me naked I would have let you," he replied offhandedly as he rubbed the shampoo between his hands.

"I was not merely—oh," ze paused as Yuuma began working the lather through zir hair. Ze leaned back against the tub again, eyes drifting closed seemingly against zir will. Ze remained quiet apart from a few small sounds of contentment until Yuuma removed his hands, rinsing them briefly in the bath. "Go under again." 

Astral obeyed, wiping zir face as ze rose again. "That is why you do not want to see my body," ze stated, surprising him. "Because other humans do not wish their bodies to be seen. But I do not care, so why should you be concerned with it?"

"Well, because you don't know any better." Yuuma grabbed the conditioner as he tried to figure out his answers to Astral's future questions. 

"What could I know better?"

"Just... it might matter to you later, and I don't want to do anything that, you know..."

"I do not know," ze replied softly, leaning zir head into his hands. 

"I just... don't want to mess up." He stopped abruptly. "Give me the washcloth." Ze fished it out of the water, and he squeezed soap onto it. "You can do the rest, just rub this all over your skin then rinse off everything. Pull the plug and dry off when you're done."

He stepped out and closed the door behind him, releasing a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. Kaito might have had a point—there seemed to be quite a bit they both didn’t know about what they’d gotten into. Well, he thought, shaking himself and stomping up to his room, he'd never let that bother him before. 

\---

Yuuma woke with his leg hanging off his hammock and one hand stuck between the knots. It had been a while since he’d slept there, he mused as he wriggled himself onto the floor. He claimed that he'd gotten too tall to sleep in it comfortably and that getting ready in the morning was faster from his bed; he'd never talked to anyone about how, with his parents back, it wasn't so important to be surrounded by their treasures; or that, with the large window to his side, there were times he stared so hard into the stars that he watched them fade with the sunrise. Now, he simply didn't trust Astral to be able to make it up the ladder and stay in the hammock all night, so he’d allocated the bed to Astral and he was back here. 

He peeked down the ladder and saw Astral already sitting up in bed. "Good morning!" he called, swinging down the rungs.  

"Good morning," ze replied. "I do not recall you being so exuberant in the morning. Is this a regular occurrence now?"

"Nope!" he replied happily, leaning over the bed and giving zim a peck on the cheek before he could get embarrassed about it. "Just you."

Astral put zir hand to zir cheek in surprise, before breaking into a smile. "This is good."

"Cheek kisses?"

“Being here when you wake.” They smiled at each other, enjoying the moment, before ze added, “Though that was good too—so it is still a kiss when on the cheek?"

"Yep."

"And where else can kisses be?"

"Anywhere." He felt bubbles rising in his chest. "Nose.” He tapped his lips against the tip of zir nose. “Forehead,” he continued, brushing zir hair from zir brow and planting a kiss. “Hand." He slid his hands along zir arm until zir hand was cupped in his and lifted it to his lips, pressing them onto the knuckles. He looked up into Astral's wide eyes and leaned forward, pulling zir hand towards him, thinking about other places he could kiss…

"Yuuma! Come help carry Grandma's luggage in!"

He jerked back, then giggled. "Wow, she's back early. Come on down so she can meet you."

Yuuma hurried them both down the stairs in their pajamas, leaving Astral in the living room as he slid on his shoes and ran out to the cab to get his grandma’s suitcase. She gave him a peck on the cheek as the cab pulled away. “Hello dear. Akari tells me you’ve brought someone to live with us.”

“Yeah, ze’s waiting to meet you!” he chirped.

He dropped her suitcase in her room and rushed back out to the living room, where she was holding one of Astral’s hands in both her own. She was in the middle of a sentence, and he came in to, “Yuuma’s brought so many boys home, I wondered when he’d bring one to stay!”

A yelp of protest lodged in his throat, but Astral replied simply with, “Oh, I am not a boy.”

“No? I’m sorry dearie, it must be Yuuma’s clothes on you. Well, you seem like a lovely child.”

Astral returned her smile, albeit a bit uncertainly, and turned to Yuuma once she moved on to greeting Akari. His face still burned from his grandma’s flippant comment, but he gave zim a thumbs up, and zir smile widened.

His grandma reminisced on her trip over breakfast, and Akari was no longer giving either him or Astral suspicious looks, instead stopping to explain things she figured Astral wouldn’t understand. This was easily the least stressful meal he’d eaten with Astral so far, and he celebrated the small triumph by doubly enjoying his food.

By the time he’d got Astral upstairs to get ready, his d-gazer pinged with a message from Kotori. “’Can you come over to my house instead?’” he read out for Astral’s benefit. “’Don’t forget to bring your uniform for…’” He squinted at the emoji, then laughed. “Look, she put a little ghost with a heart for you!”

He left Astral to puzzle over the image as he pulled out clothes for the both of them, making sure to grab a belt for zir slim frame and digging out his school uniform from where it had been shoved at the start of summer break. August was drawing to a close, but the heat wave hadn’t broken yet, so they both got shorts and tanks to compensate. “Do you want Kurivolt or Rainbow Kuriboh?” he asked, holding both shirts up for zir inspection.

“Why do you have so many Kuriboh-themed shirts?”

“I got them at KuriBand last year!” he said with a grin; then, at Astral’s blank stare, added, “It’s like, this AR vision concert where all the different Kuribohs perform, and they sell merch of them, so I got mine!”

“Do you not think it unwise to advertise what cards you use with your clothing?”

He scowled, tossing Rainbow Kuriboh at Astral before peeling off his pajamas. As his shirt cleared his head, he spotted zim watching him over the shirt in zir hands. Zir eyes immediately widened. “Oh, should I look away?”

“Oh, uh, no, I’m wearing boxers so it’s fine,” he replied, embarrassed that he’d just started changing without thinking about that. Old habits, he guessed…

Astral nodded, adding softly, “You look very different.”

“How so?”

“You are… bigger.”

Yuuma laughed. “Okay, I get it, you’re mad I’m taller than you now.”

“Oh, no,” ze protested, then smiled sheepishly. “I did comment on that before, but I did not mean your height this time. Rather, you are considerably more muscular, and your shoulders are broader.”

“Uh, yeah, puberty…” he floundered weakly, then found himself giving a laugh that felt tight and a pitch too high. “Hurry up, we need to go soon!” he rushed out, pulling his clothes on and not looking while Astral changed. It was stupid; he’d seen Astral naked last night, he could hardly complain about zim looking at him shirtless. But, well, it didn’t mean anything to Astral, and it meant a lot to him; a lot he didn’t want to think about, not least for fear of proving Akari’s first reactions right, damn her.

Astral wound up needing his help with the belt, and he had to go borrow a pair of Akari’s sandals to fit zir feet, but they were soon out the door and at the train station. Ze was nervous at first (the only time ze’d been on a train before was when they were dueling Charlie for Number 7), but soon ze was gaping out the window and rocking with the movement of the train.

Kotori’s building was only about a block away from the station, which was good, because ze was already looking particularly unsteady when they arrived. They rode the elevator up where Yuuma would have typically bounded up the stairs and then were knocking on the apartment door.

“Hi Mrs. Mizuki!” he greeeted as she opened the door for them.

“Hey, come on in!” she beamed, gesturing them into the entryway. “Kotori told me she was having guests, and I’m sure she mentioned your name, but I’m sorry, I forgot. You are…?”

“Astral,” ze replied. She paused, clearly expecting a last name, but since neither of them had one to offer yet, Yuuma pretended not to notice.

Luckily, she recovered quickly. “It’s lovely to meet you, Astral. Kotori said you’ll be joining her class when school starts back. Did you just move into the area?”

"Yes." Yuuma was realizing that small talk was not one of Astral's skills, and he'd have to jump in soon.  

"Kotori mentioned she knows you through Yuuma, how do you two know each other?"

"I am his partner."

Yuuma flinched as Mrs. Mizuki’s eyes widened. Sheesh, it wasn't like he wanted their relationship to be a secret, but still. "Yuuma, you never mentioned you were seeing anyone!" she scolded.

"It's, um, only just become official," he said, trying doubly hard to speak calmly to distract from the heat he felt in his face. "It was... long distance."

"Oh, then how did you two meet?"

Yuuma knew he had to reply quickly, before she noticed the panicked look Astral was giving him. "Um... through my dad!" He laughed nervously as both of them looked at him in surprise. "Yeah, it sounds weird, but my dad met zim on an expedition and then we started talking!" It struck Yuuma that this was not, technically, a lie.

"Wow, then where are you from, Astral?"

Ze looked, if possible, even more panicked. _Shit, bad idea_ , he muttered to himself, wracking his brain for somewhere she wouldn't know anything about and coming up blank. "Ah, we always forget what it is in Japanese, huh?" he said, nudging Astral. "Ze always uses its name in zir native language, and it's such a tiny place that you never hear about it, so I always forget..."

He could have hugged Kotori as she appeared in the hall. "Hey you two!" she called, looking between them. "What's wrong? Has mom been teasing you?"

"Only a little," Mrs. Mizuki said with a smile. "I'll leave you all alone now, have fun!"

Yuuma gave a dramatic sigh of relief once they were safely in Kotori's bedroom. "We've got to come up with Astral's pretend past."

She laughed. "Don't worry, we can just tell my mom she's misremembering and she'll believe it. Did you bring your uniform?"

"Yeah." He fished it out of his bag, handing the roll of fabric over to Kotori.

She scrunched her nose as she shook it out. "Well Astral, just imagine it's not wrinkled when you try it on."

Astral had no problem stripping down to boxers to pull the uniform on, and Kotori busied herself with pulling more clothes from her closet. "What are you doing? Your uniform's already out," he said, looking at it spread neatly on her bed.

"I know, I want to let Astral try on more stuff, see what ze likes."

Yuuma left her to it to help zim figure out how to button the shirt and tuck it in and adjust the tie. “There, what do you think?”

Ze moved zir limbs experimentally. It was at least a size too big, but it still didn’t look half-bad on zim. Then again, Yuuma figured, ze would look good in a trash bag. “The tie and belt feel… heavy, but otherwise it is not so bad,” Astral voiced.

“Yeah, ties are annoying,” Yuuma agreed. “But here, come see how you look.” He wheeled zim in front of Kotori’s mirror and peeked at zir reflection from zir shoulder.

Zir expression looked critical. “It is strange. My shape is so distorted. I do not know if I have an opinion on it.”

“That’s okay. Go try Kotori’s on.”

Hers fit zim rather better, though the skirt was short enough that zir boxers peeked from under it and the shirt wrinkled a bit around the chest. Ze made a face, wriggling zir shoulders. “I feel as if I cannot move my arms in this.” Ze swished the skirt around zir legs. "I think I like skirts though. It feels less like wearing clothes."

“It’s a good look for you,” Kotori commented, strangely pink in the cheeks. Yuuma figured she overexerted herself dragging half her wardrobe out.

“You have to be careful about flashing people when you wear them though, don’t you?” he asked her.

She shot him a disgusted look. "Don't listen to him Astral. If you wanna wear skirts, you can flash anyone you want."

"Don't teach zim weird things like that!"

" _You_ don't teach zim body shame two days after ze gets a body!" she replied, poking a finger into his chest.

Grumbling, they both turned back to Astral, to find that ze’d stripped off the blouse and stood shirtless in the too-short school-girl skirt. “Would I be able to wear the other shirt with this?”

Yuuma jumped, registering the heat in his face and the hitch in his breath. “I’ll help you try it out!” he said a little too loudly, grabbing the shirt off the pile forming on the bed.

“I’ll go check the student manual!” Kotori squeaked, and when he glanced over and saw her reddened face, he couldn’t keep a pout of jealousy off his face.

“Is something wrong?” Astral queried.

“Nope!” Yuuma replied, shoving the shirt onto zim. “Here, you’ll have to tuck it in…”

The shirt ballooned out from zir waist before being confined by the skirt, and each of the pieces emphasized how ill-fitting the other was, but somehow it looked right on zim.

Astral nodded with a tiny smile, leaning on the bed and kicking each leg out in turn. “I like it. I mean, it is still wearing clothes, but it feels somewhat more natural.”

Kotori reentered her room with the student handbook in her hand. “Well, it just says ‘pants or skirt’ and ‘shirt or blouse,’ so I think it’s fine to mix the boys’ and girls’ uniforms. Oh—Astral, you look great!”

Zir smile widened. _At least she’s not blushing anymore_ , Yuuma grumbled internally.

“Would you like to try on some more of my clothes? I have some stuff I could give you.”

“Yes, I would like that.”

Kotori weeded out some of the clothes she’d brought out based on Astral’s feedback (too tight, too scratchy, too heavy) and left a pile for zim to pick through.

Yuuma chuckled as ze started with a loose skirt and peasant blouse. “All your clothes are so girly, Kotori.”

“What’s wrong with that?” she demanded.

“Nothing! It’s just funny to think of someone I’ve known as an incorporeal spirit for so long wearing them.”

“Why should girl clothes be any funnier than zim wearing boy clothes?”

“Well, ze’s just been wearing whatever’s been around ‘til now. Your girl clothes seem so much more… on purpose.”

Kotori scoffed. “You not having a sense of style has nothing to do with you being a boy, Yuuma.”

“Hey!” he grumbled, but she was already staring pointedly away, so he returned the gesture.

After a moment of silence except for the rustling of clothes, he turned back, to see her watching Astral pull a shirt over zir head. “Kotori!” he hissed, jabbing her in the ribs with his elbow.

“Hm?” she asked, startled.

“Stop checking out Astral!”

Her face reddened as she scrunched her eyes shut. “I’m sorry, I’m trying!” she pleaded in a whisper. “It’s not my fault ze’s so pretty!”

“I don’t have time for your victim blaming, Kotori! Am I going to have to fight you?”

“Oh, shut up.”

“Duel me. Right now.”

“Yuuma, that is not even fair!”

“Um,” Astral said, and they both turned back with plastered smiles. “You keep referring to the clothes as boy clothes or girl clothes, and I am concerned. Can I wear them, since I am not…?”

“Oh, yeah!” Yuuma hurriedly explained. “It’s just, like, who they were made for, not who can wear them!”

“I see. But… you and Kotori are a boy and a girl, and you wear boy clothes and girl clothes respectively, is that correct?”

“Yeah, I mean, most people—er, well, a lot of people, anyway—wear the same clothes as their gender—no wait, that’s not right, ‘cause clothes don’t _have_ genders, it’s just, um…”

Astral cut in while he got muddled in his words. “I do not know how I could wear clothes the same as my gender, since I do not… Is gender something necessary for being human?”

Yuuma panicked at the worried expression on zir face, but Kotori dropped a hand on his shoulder. “Let me explain this, Yuuma.”

She grabbed Astral and set them both on the bed, shoving some of the clothes to the ground. Yuuma plopped into a beanbag chair against the wall.

"Okay, Astral, I’m going to tell you something. People didn't always know I was a girl. When I was little, my parents thought I was a boy.”

Astral’s eyes widened. "How could your own parents be mistaken about that?"

“It’s because people usually guess people’s genders based on what their body looks like, but that’s not actually what gender is. So a lot of the time they’re wrong. When I was born, people thought I was a boy because of how I looked. But I knew I wasn't, and I was able to tell people that I was actually a girl. And if I wasn't a boy or a girl, I could have told them that too. It doesn’t matter what other people think your gender should be, just what you think about it. So, y’know, how you are is fine. If you wind up being a boy or a girl or a mix between the two, that's okay too, but you don't have to be either."

Astral nodded slowly. "How would I know if I was?"

"It's just a feeling. It can be confusing, but if it's important, you'll figure it out eventually.”

“I see.” Astral smiled, tilting zir head thoughtfully. “I am glad it is not something I need to worry about, but it may be something I think on more. I can tell you were simplifying it for me, so clearly there is much I do not know.” Kotori laughed at that. “Is it common for people to have to correct others about their gender?”

“Sure, I’m not even the only trans person in our group of friends—oh, trans is a word for the people whose gender isn’t what other people think it would be based on their body. So anyway, yeah, there’s lots of people like that.” She stood, putting the clothes she’d shoved off back onto the bed. “Now, you ready to try on some clothes and not worry about who people think they’re for?”

Ze gave a small laugh, sliding off the bed. “Yes.”

Seeing that the conversation was finished, Yuuma jumped up and threw his arms around both of them. “Ah, Kotori, I never could have explained that! You’re so cool!”

Kotori dropped her armful of clothes as he jostled her, and she shoved him off. “ _You_ need to cool.”

Astral turned to him, his arm still flung over zir shoulder. “It is a good thing you have friends more knowledgeable than you, or I would never understand being human. It is surprising you pull it off so well yourself.”

“Hey!” he pouted, turning and crossing his arms, but then ze leaned over and kissed his cheek, and he was blushing and Kotori was snickering at him and Astral surveyed him with a smug smirk, and he couldn’t very well stay mad in the face of that, could he?


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Miraculously, I'm not dead and neither is this fic.
> 
> Warning for explicit-ish make-out scene at the end? If that's not your thing. I'm not sure if it's my thing.

Astral chewed zir lip broodingly. It was quite amazing, ze thought when ze noticed, how many little motions and habits zir body seemed to pick up on its own. Ze’d always thought many of the quirks of movement and speech others displayed strange, but now ze saw that there wasn’t much choice in the matter—the body reacted to things, and sometimes those reactions made sense, and sometimes they did not. The slight discomfort in zir lip was grounding, ze supposed, a physical awareness that kept zim from getting completely swept away in thought.

Ze’d gotten much better at many physical things over the past few days, particularly walking—ze’d gotten a lot of practice. Though Kotori had given zim several pieces of clothing, Yuuma informed zim that wouldn’t be enough unless ze wanted to keep borrowing his clothes, and Akari announced that she’d be taking both of them school shopping anyway. That had involved lots of walking around stores and trying on many more clothes than ze ever wanted to, as well as a plethora of notebooks, pens, and highlighters. (Ze was relieved to find that ze could write, though zir handwriting was a bit sloppy.)

After that, while they went through Yuuma’s deck (with the two of them sprawled out in the attic, it was like reliving a memory, and it was good), Astral noted that ze still couldn’t summon either zir duel disk or cards. Yuuma looked horrified (of course he hadn’t thought of it, the idiot, ze mused fondly), and immediately rushed them out to remedy the situation. They got zim a glitter-inlaid turquoise duel disk that made zim smile and enough packs to make zim a makeshift deck when combined with some of Yuuma’s extra cards.

Then, of course, came actually getting zim into school. Durbe came over periodically to help them puzzle over the paperwork they needed to forge. Yuuma wound up calling his parents to figure out a place Astral could be from; they both crowded the screen excitedly to see zim. Meanwhile, Haru ordered zir uniform, with a pair of pants in addition to the shirt and skirt ze requested. (“In case you get cold,” she said, patting zir cheek. “You look like the wind will blow right through you.”)

The documents were almost ready; the only thing they lacked was a name, and that was what ze brooded about.

There had been suggestions—Yuuma tried to be helpful, throwing out common Japanese surnames and looking up names from the culture they were pretending ze was from. Haruto visited (after the Numbers Club and the Arclights had already paid their visits and Kaito ran out of excuses) and offered a suggestion of his own.

“I know! You can have my name!”

Astral gave him a startled look. “Excuse me?”

“Yeah! Astral Tenjo! You can be my sibling!”

“Haruto, that’s not…” Kaito began, looking mildly panicked, but his brother continued over him.

“It’ll be fine. You’re the oldest, I’m the youngest, and Astral can be in the middle. We even look alike!” Haruto finished, holding out a lock of his light-blue hair to compare with Astral’s and tugging his lower lid down needlessly to emphasize his honey-gold eyes. 

Ze was fascinated to notice he had a point, but politely declined. The offer was heartwarming, in a way, but it didn’t feel right. Kaito looked relieved and headed off any further argument from Haruto. (“People would wonder why ze wasn’t living with us if we were family, anyway.” “Well, ze _could_.” “Well, ze’s _not_.”)

“Astral, come on, just pick something!” Yuuma groaned as ze flipped through the papers again that night.

“I cannot simply pick something. It will be my name.”

“Sure you can, it doesn’t really matter. It’s just to put something on paper.”

Astral frowned. “Is that all your name is to you, something on paper?”

Yuuma paused, sitting up from where he was half-hanging off the couch. “No, I guess not.”

Ze laid the papers back on the table and turned to him. “What is it, then?”

“I’ve never really thought about it before, but… well, I’m not sure about my given name, but I hear it so often that it just feels like me, like my identity, and I like it when, uh—when people who care about me say it.” Astral nodded, and he continued. “And my family name, it’s a reminder of everything I’ve gotten from my family, or like a marker of where I came from in life. Does that make sense?”

“Completely. I have been considering it for some time and come to a similar conclusion. But that is what is so difficult about choosing another name—my name already serves both those purposes in some sense.”

“Oooh, because your name is Astral and you’re from Astral World.”

Astral stared at a page where zir first name was already written in one of the blanks. “I do not believe my name was ever meant to serve the purpose that your given name does. They said so themselves—I was never meant to have an identity. My name was simply a marker of what I was meant to represent, to be the Emissary of Astral World. It has become more, of course. As you said, with others saying it to me, it has also come to represent the bonds I have forged, and the things they have helped me learn about myself. Nevertheless, if I am choosing a name for myself, I would like it to mean something more. Something indicative of the life I am choosing.”

Ze looked up at a sniff from Yuuma to see his eyes welling. “You can have my name if you want!”

“What? That is not what I—”

“I don’t care if people think it’s weird! I just—oh my god they didn’t even give you a real name—!”

“Yuuma!”

Eventually Astral calmed him down, but he stayed hugging onto zir arm. Ze gave a small sigh. “Yuuma… tell me about myself.”

“Hm? What do you mean?”

“A name that conveys something of who I have become—what would it convey?”

Yuuma wrinkled his nose at zim. “You know who you are better than anyone. Anyway, I’ve told you what I think of you a million times.”

“Nevertheless, I like to hear it. Do you still think I’m beautiful?”

“What?” he asked, finally sitting back upright to look at Astral.

“You said I looked like stars, or something to that effect.” Ze curled and uncurled zir fingers, feeling the way it changed the sensation of zir skin. “I wondered if you still thought me beautiful, now that I no longer possess the qualities you said made me so.”

“What are you even talking about? Sure you still do.” He reached out and gently traced lines between the birthmark-like point at zir brow and neck. “The stars are all still there, they just look different. Like… what is it that makes starts look different from earth?”

“The atmosphere.”

“Yeah. You just have an atmosphere now. You look a little different, but you’re still the same—the most beautiful thing in two dimensions.” Yuuma gave a teasing smile, fingers resting on one of the marks on zir neck. “That’s at least—I haven’t been to the others, so I can’t say for sure. But I have a theory.”

“Hm,” Astral murmured, eyes half drifting shut. “Perhaps we should visit the others, so you can come to a more informed conclusion.” Yuuma laughed; after a moment, Astral continued. “You said something else then. Something about galaxies. What was it?”

His face reddened. “Th-that you were like a galaxy?”

“Go on, what else?”

He scowled. “Oh, cut it out.”

“I would like to hear it again.”

Yuuma’s voice wavered as he obliged. “That… that you’re a galaxy I want to map every star of.” His fingers trembled against zir skin, and ze leaned into the touch as his hand curled around zir shoulder and ze caught the toothpaste smell of his breath…

Astral’s eyes had nearly drifted shut when ze shot upright and Yuuma gave a squeak of surprise. “Yes. Yes, that’s what it is.”

\---

Astral woke Yuuma early on the first day of school. There’d be no running to make up time, not with zir legs still as spindly and prone to giving out as they were. (Alito had enthusiastically offered to train with zim, and ze backed out with as much grace as possible, but Yuuma seemed intent on doing much the same.) He grumbled sleepily as they got dressed, and Astral sat back on the bed when ze was finished, watching him struggled to button his shirt. “I suppose the novelty of waking up with me has worn off, then,” ze quipped. 

He gave a pleading groan. “Don’t guilt me this early in the morning.”

Downstairs, Haru had packed both their lunches and prepared duel rice for breakfast; they each grabbed one and their bags and started the walk to school.

“I can’t believe you still like these so much after you made yourself sick on them,” Yuuma mused as Astral took a giant bite. Ze raised zir eyebrows over zir stuffed cheeks—how could ze _not_?

“Oi, Yuuma, Astral!” Tetsuo appeared as they crossed a street and joined them. “Wow, I still can’t believe you’re actually here!”

Chatting as they walked, the three arrived outside the school into a group of students catching up after the break. Alito waved them over to where he stood with Vector and some of the Number’s Club.

“Shingetsu?” Tetsuo asked as they joined the group. “Yuuma’s got Astral to get him up now, what’s your excuse for being here so early?”

“By ‘so early’ you mean ‘not so late’?” Takashi asked in a tone of long-suffering.

“Well I couldn’t miss zir big debut,” Vector retorted with a smile.

Cathy grabbed Yuuma’s elbow and started in on a story from her vacation that had everyone alternating between horrified gasps and laughter, and Vector gave Astral a once-over as Yuuma turned to her. "Nice legs. Guess it's not a total waste for him."

Ze looked down at zir legs, thighs visible between zir skirt and socks. “…Thank you,” ze replied cautiously. “I walked here with them.”

He threw his head back with an exuberant laugh. “Ah, Blue, if that joke came from anyone else I’d think it was on purpose.”

“Blue?” ze muttered, but then a bell rang and Yuuma caught zir hand, pulling zim into the building.

\---

The first day went… alright, Astral thought. Yuuma had told zim how to introduce zimself, so when the teacher called, ze went up and said, “My name is Astral Pyxis. I have moved to Heartland from abroad.” A murmur went around the room; they’d decided to mention Astral’s imaginary origins as little as possible, but ze wondered if it would have been better to say it once and avoid questions. “I enjoy dueling and math.” Ze didn’t know if ze did enjoy math, but ze knew ze understood it; Kotori told zim that ze had to say something in addition to dueling (“Astral, please don’t just say dueling” had been her exact words), and Durbe said that a school subject would sound good.

Ze bowed and sat down in the empty seat behind Michael, who gave zim a smile and a thumbs-up as ze passed.

Ze’d hung around in Yuuma’s classes enough to have an idea of what went on, but usually hadn’t stayed through the lessons: ze could only ever half understand them, and Yuuma would yell at zim for trying to talk to him in class when ze had questions. It soon became clear that, even now that ze could flip through the books on zir own, ze still couldn’t understand them. Ze was flooded with relief when the teacher said that was to be expected, transferring in the middle of the year from an entirely different country; and Takashi, sitting to zir right, immediately volunteered to assist zim. It became much easier to follow along after that, with him explaining in whispers the missing connections that everyone else was able to use their human experiences to supply.

Lunchtime found their group piled together outside in the last of the summer sun. Shark, Rio, and Durbe strolled up to join them as their class got out, Rio shoving Alito over so she could sit next to Kotori. “How are you holding up?” Durbe asked Astral, finding a spot on one of the crowded benches.

“Well enough, I think. I feel as though I will adjust.”

“Ze’s doing great!” Takashi interjected, leaning over to the two of them, and ze smiled at the unexpected praise.

Two others Astral didn’t recognize wandered over towards them. Astral thought they must be friends ze hadn’t met, but the others seemed surprised to see them as well. Kotori greeted them by name, and after responding with the appropriate niceties, one added, “We wanted to introduce ourselves to Astral.”

They did more than introduce themselves—they asked where ze was from, and ze recited the origin story that Kotori and Durbe had drilled into zim, and then they asked why ze had moved to Heartland.

That hadn’t been rehearsed, but ze thought the answer was simple enough. “To be with Yuuma.”

In the sudden silence that followed, ze knew ze’d made a mistake. “Y-Yuuma?” one repeated.

“Yeah.” Yuuma spun his legs over the bench to face the conversation. He was blushing brightly, but his expression challenged any questions. “Ze’s my partner.”

The quieter of the two gave a sudden gasp. “Oh my god, that’s so romantic! Did you two meet online?”

“I should not have said that, I take it?” Astral queried once the duo finally left.

Yuuma hung his head in a laugh. “No, it’s fine. You’ve always been blunt, I don’t know why I would expect anything different.”

“It’s going to be all over school by the end of the day,” Rio cackled, “Yuuma’s mysterious foreign lover.”

Whether their relationship had spread around the school by the end of the day was unclear, but Astral’s presence certainly had. Most everyone in their class stopped by to meet zim at lunch, and a few people from Rio’s class used greeting her as an excuse to stop by as well. Between that and struggling to get zir footing in the afternoon lessons, Astral was struck by the irrational desire to disappear into the key that hung around Yuuma’s neck.

“They’re just curious because they think you’re foreign,” Kotori comforted zim.

“Yeah, they did the same thing with me and Durbe and Mizael,” Alito chimed in, “they’ll get bored soon enough.”

“Are you sure they didn’t just get bored of your personality?” Vector asked.

“Though you are technically the most foreign person they’ll ever meet,” Tokonosuke mused over the sound of their bickering. That didn’t make Astral feel better about the attention.

“Can we go home after this?” ze asked after classes ended, listlessly wiping off the board while others straightened the desks and swept the floor.

“Yeah, Akari just messaged me saying she’s nearby for work, so we don’t need to walk back.”

Astral gave a sigh of relief, closing zir eyes for a moment and plonking zir head against the board.

“You look really tired.” Yuuma frowned down at zim. “Sit down, I’ll finish it.” He plucked the eraser from zir hand, so ze lowered zimself into the nearest desk while he sprinted back and forth before the board, wiping at it carelessly.

Astral heard a muffled giggle and turned to see Vector perched atop a desk, one leg swinging freely.

“What is it you find amusing?” Astral asked.

“Hm?” Vector looked at zim sideways, raising his brows as if he’d just noticed zim. “Oh, nothing really. It’s just that it’s like watching an attack dog being treated like a lap dog.” He grinned as he added, “Has he taught you any tricks yet?”

“What?”

“Nothing, nothing, forget I asked.”

“Gladly,” Astral muttered.

Vector jumped off the desk; Takashi yelled at him from the back of the class for messing up the row he’d just straightened. “Just work on those puppy dog eyes if you want to keep getting petted, okay?”

Yuuma ran back up then, grabbing zir hand. “Akari’s here, let’s go!” He laced their fingers together, and Vector shot Astral a knowing smile as Yuuma dragged zim out of the classroom.

\---

The rest of the week proceeded smoothly enough, with Astral needing less and less help during class. Ze did enjoy math, it turned out, but it came incredibly easy for zim. This was comforting in a world full of things ze didn’t know, but ze found zimself drawn more to those subjects that elucidated zir ignorance: biology, psychology, cultural studies, human workings from inside the cell to their most expansive cultures. Michael noticed zir interest and loaned zim his favorite anthropology book, and ze discovered that the only thing all humans had in common was that they were interesting everywhere and always.

And the _stories_! An entire class dedicated to learning about stories that humans told each other! Ze’d asked Yuuma if they would ever talk about ESPer Robin and he’d said something about pop culture and classics and curriculums, but since ze’d already seen it all ze didn’t mind sticking with new things. And each one said so much! They said things between the words and behind them and in the words left unsaid, not just about the story itself but about the person who wrote it and about the hurts and wants that humans shared. It was so much more than ze’d ever imagined.

They—we?—no, ze couldn’t quite think of zimself as human. But ze wanted to, because they were incredible.

\---

By the end of the week, Yuuma was as exhausted as Astral. Despite talking earlier in the week about all they would do over the weekend, by Friday night he dismissed Astral’s queries with, “We’ll start on Saturday.”

“Alright, g’night Astral!” Yuuma called, making his way to the ladder in the semi-dark.

“Yuuma,” Astral called hesitantly.

“Hm?”

“Do you… strongly prefer sleeping in your hammock, still?”

“Uh, it depends, I guess?” he replied, sounding a bit confused. “I’d started sleeping in the bed usually, actually, just ‘cause it was easier getting up in the morning.”

Zir eyes lost focus in the darkness, shifting carelessly over abstract shapes in the corner of the room. “Oh, I… I see.”

“Why? What’s up?”

Astral flinched as ze felt Yuuma’s unexpected weight settle onto the bed beside zim. “It is just that… you always choose to sleep there, rather than… here.”

“But… you sleep here.”

“Yes, that is what I was getting at.” As zir eyes adjusted, ze could see his concerned expression, and ze continued quickly. “It is just that, when I was incorporeal, I was nearly always present as you slept, and I have not been able to be since I have come here again. I suppose it seems a strange thing to miss, but… I do.”

“N-no,” Yuuma stammered, “I understand. It’s just that, um, our relationship is different now, right?”

“And this means we cannot sleep together?”

He flushed, raking his hand through his hair awkwardly. “Uh, well, no, it just, uh… means that, um, sleeping together, it kind of uh, means something different now. Than it did before,” he finished weakly.

Astral considered this. “I do not feel this to be the case. To me, it was previously a way to appreciate a different aspect of you than your waking self, and to witness part of you others do not see. Admittedly, I would also be asleep now, but I believe it would have similar impact.”

Yuuma was distinctly flustered now, staring determinedly at his hands in his lap. “I do not mean to try to convince you to do something you do not wish,” ze added hurriedly. “I only meant that… it was…”

“No no!” he answered, grabbing one of zir hands in his own. “No, it’s fine, I want you to tell me things like this. And I… I’d like to sleep—here with you,” he stumbled. “But it has different, uh, implications now, like… like how we only kiss each other, right?”

“It is a… unique form of intimacy, correct?”

“Right! And I just want to be careful that we’re not moving too fast, or doing things we’ll regret, or…”

Ze waited for him to find the words, but he seemed to have petered out. “Yuuma,” ze started gently, “I understand—well, not quite, but I respect that this represents a certain kind of intimacy for us. And I am certainly not asking you to do anything you think you will regret. However, I do not think that this would be... going too fast. We have shared a consciousness before.”

Yuuma made a pained face that ze couldn’t interpret at first, casting his eyes at the bedroom door. “Akari can’t find out about this, she’d flip.”

“Hm?”

He grabbed the covers and sent them flying upward as he rolled into bed beside zim. “Ah,” ze gasped, the cool gust of air accentuating the sudden heat of Yuuma’s body brushing against zirs.

“You’ll have to share the pillows,” he told zim.

The two of them shifted the pillows and blankets around, and at the end of their adjusting ended lying on their sides, face-to-face. “Is this better?” he asked, a somewhat bashful smile playing on his face.

“Mm,” Astral murmured with a smile, savoring the heat moving between them. “You said this is similar to kissing?”

“In a way, yeah.”

“Can we do that now?”

Ze was very confused by Yuuma’s next reaction: he gave a long whine, grabbing the corners of his pillow and wrapping it around his head. “Astral…”

“I am sorry I asked. It is something I find very comforting and, well, pleasing. I assumed that you also did, since you initiated this practice between us, but…” Ze trailed off, feeling zir face grow hot—perhaps ze had misunderstood, and it was not enjoyable for him…

“Silly.” Yuuma had released his pillow, pressing one finger to zir lips. “Of course I like it.” He brought his other arm around, bringing them closer together as he cupped the back of zir head in his hand. “Remember what I said all those years ago? Being with you is happiness for me. That hasn’t changed.”

Unnamable emotions swirled through Astral as Yuuma pulled their heads together and kissed zim. Ze felt zir eyes fluttering shut, already unfocused. His lips moved rhythmically against zirs, chapped edges gently scraping zim, until, after an eternity of warm euphoric contact, ze felt his tongue graze between zir lips.

Ze gave a sharp gasp as the sensation permeated zir body. Yuuma pulled his head back quickly, peering into zir eyes. “Was that okay?”

“Is…” Ze took a steadying breath. “Is that also a part of kissing?”

“Mm-hm,” he murmured hesitantly.

“That was incredible.”

Yuuma released a relieved giggle. “Good,” he said, then moved in again, tongue probing at zir parted lips.

Astral reveled in the electric currents coursing through zir body as Yuuma ran his tongue along the wet inner edges of zir lips. Then he pushed farther in, brushing against the roof of zir mouth just behind zir teeth, and zir breath was coming in soft whimpers. Yuuma’s breath was similarly troubled, and, feeling their breath mix heavily between them, it occurred to Astral that ze could use zir own tongue in this endeavor. Ze pushed forward, and as their tongues slid against each other, a deep moan climbed out of zir throat.

Yuuma pulled away suddenly, flipping onto his back, and Astral froze. “Did I do something wrong?” ze asked breathlessly.

“No, no,” he gasped, breath still harsh and uneven, one hand creeping up to half-hide his face. “It’s just—I’m hard.”

Astral knit zir brows together in confusion, trying to parse the words passed the blood pounding in zir ears. “You are indeed difficult sometimes, but what does that have to do with us kissing?”

Yuuma looked affronted. He gave a disgusted “Ugh!” and turned again, back to Astral, who’s confusion only grew.

“What? What did—”

“Nothing, it doesn’t matter now!” Yuuma grumbled.

Bewildered and body still alive with new sensations, ze lowered zir hand onto his side. “I very much liked that, Yuuma.”

He sighed, taking zir hand in his own and pulling zir arm over him. “I did too, Astral.” He lifted zir palm to his lips, pressing a hard kiss into the center. “I did too.”

They settled into that position, Yuuma’s back curled into zir body, their hands laced at his chest, and Astral felt zir eyes drifting closed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much to anyone keeping up with this (or just now discovering it)! Life is happening so progress will be slow but sure.
> 
> If you can, please comment/message me/something, even if it's just "good chapter" or something. I get worried that my writing has spontaneously become terrible. On which note, I'm also open to critiques of writing style, like "your sentences are too long" or "Yuuma blushes too much please calm down."
> 
> Finally, thanks to yumanaa and the others on tumblr who gave me the inspiration I needed to pick Astral's name. Pyxis: the mariner's compass. Useful for mapping galaxies.


	8. Chapter 8

Astral woke early as usual, even on a Saturday, and Yuuma grumbled a bit as ze slid off the bed from under his arm. He drifted in and out of sleep, occasionally aware of the shower running, until he startled awake at his name.

“Yuuma!” He shot up as Akari opened the door. “Oh, sorry Astral.”

He turned to see Astral sitting at his desk, shirtless with a towel draped over zir hair and shoulders. “It is alright.”

She turned back to Yuuma, slightly breathless. “Mom and Dad are here.”

Yuuma yelped, skipping out of bed as his sheets caught one foot. “Like, _here_ here?”

“Yeah, they’re just bringing their stuff in. Come on.”

He finally kicked his foot free and hopped to the door, turning to Astral as he went. “Get dressed and come down!”

“Ah—yes!” Astral called back, rubbing the towel over zir hair.

He bounded down the stairs and was pulled into a hug at the bottom. “Ack—Mom!” Over her shoulder, he could see his dad spin Akari around as she gave a muffled squeal.

After his parents had traded children and his grandma came in to welcome them back, they turned at a creak on the stairs. Astral hesitated on the last step, silver-blue hair mussed and damp, one hand on the banister and one of Yuuma’s t-shirts hanging loosely on zir shoulders.

Yuuma suddenly remembered how in love he was.

No time for that now, though—his parents ushered Astral onto the couch and sat on either side of zim, asking rapid-fire questions about how ze got a body and why ze needed it and what it was like to have one for the first time. Yuuma relaxed once he realized this revolved around souls and dimensions and the metaphysical, and was not likely to divert into _Well, your son and I tried to run away together…_

His grandmother went to the kitchen and came out with snacks. When she saw his parents still at their interrogation, she frowned, dropping the snacks on the table and batting at his father’s shoulder. “Kazuma, let the child breathe! Try being a father instead of an adventurer for five minutes and ask your kids some questions instead!”

“I think I’m doing a great job as a father!” he protested. Setting a hand on Astral’s shoulder, he continued, “I set my son up with a wonderful alien, for example.”

Yuuma gagged. “You didn’t set us up!”

“Kazuma is the reason we were able to meet.”

“That’s not—it’s not the same thing, Astral! And don’t just use my dad’s name!”

Astral tilted zir head, lips pursed. “What am I supposed to use?”

“It’s okay, you can call me Kazuma.”

“And you can call me Mirai!”

“Augh!”

Astral looked between them and, seeming to make a decision, shoved the snacks his grandma had brought out into zir mouth.

“So Astral, what—oh,” his dad cut off as Astral gave a helpless shrug passed zir full mouth. Yuuma snorted. “Well, Yuuma, has the adjustment been alright? Your sister was concerned when she called us.”

Akari had the grace to blush. “Astral’s actually been doing really well, right Yuuma?” He nodded enthusiastically as Astral froze mid-swallow, eyes wide. “And ze helps clean more than Yuuma does.”

“Hey!”

Still, Yuuma was glad that family teasing was the worst to come out of the day. Astral’s visible tension slowly drained away as they helped his parents settle in for their stay (who could say how long that would be), and they asked zim how ze liked school (quite well, ze said) and if ze got along with all of Yuuma’s friends (ze hesitated before replying in the affirmative).

Over lunch, Akari made a joke to their dad about loving Yuuma more than her, and he replied with, “I love all my children. Of course, Astral is my favorite.” For the rest of the meal Astral stumbled over zir food with a bewildered smile.

“Have you been anywhere interesting, Astral?” his mom asked.

“Interesting?”

“Yeah, I mean, I hope you haven’t just been going to school and coming back!”

Ze seemed confused. “Well, I have not been here long.”

“Yuuma!” she rounded on him.

He jolted upright. “Ah?”

“You need to get zim out more! Ze can’t come live a human life and waste it!”

“I do not think I am wasting anything,” Astral replied levelly, flicking the briefest glance at Yuuma and making his heart lurch.

Still, his mother’s admonition gave him an idea. Afterwards, he took out his d-gazer and sent a rapid text to Alito.

“Yuuma! Astral’s doing your share of the cleaning again!”

“Coming!”

\---

One early weekend morning, Astral was startled awake by Yuuma jostling zir shoulder. “Wake up, Astral, time to go!”

“Yuuma, what…” Ze was less startled from being woken than from Yuuma being up first.

“Just get dressed, I’ll explain later!” he grinned. Glancing at him occasionally, Astral obliged, pulling some clothes from the closet. “Not those,” he added, pushing zir first choices back and retrieving a t-shirt and loose pants. Ze gave him a curious look, but took them.

Soon Astral was dressed and being hurried down the stairs, to where Alito sat waiting on the couch. Ze dug zir heels into the step, bracing zimself on the railing. “ _No_.”

Alito was laughing, jumping up from the couch and towards them. “Come on, I said I’d go easy on you!”

“And I said that wouldn’t be necessary,” Astral replied, gripping the banister tighter as Yuuma tried to nudge zim forward.

“It won’t be that bad Astral,” Yuuma coaxed. “You can’t keep needing breaks on the walk home from school.”

“If I cannot walk back without breaks I can hardly expect to manage whatever you two have planned,” ze replied tersely.

“That’s not how getting stronger works. Now come on.” With that, Yuuma threaded his arms under zirs and lifted zim up by zir armpits.

“Yuuma! Put me down!” Ze flailed wildly as he carried zim to the door.

Alito laughed as he trailed after them. “It’s for your own good!”

“We’ll go somewhere you’ll like, okay?”

Zir flailing slowed, and Alito added, “You can eat more when you work out.”

Astral’s eyes narrowed as Yuuma set zim down by the door. “Is this true?” ze asked, looking between them.

“You’re so easy,” Yuuma laughed, herding zim out the door.

Their first stop turned out to be the train, so Astral had a bit of a respite. Ze watched the city go by curiously, until they exited at the final stop on the edge of the city.

“Oh,” ze breathed into the morning quiet. “We have not been out of the city since I’ve been back.” Ze hadn’t expected air to feel different by location, but it felt fuller away from the crowded streets, and the chill that hinted at an approaching autumn sent goosebumps down zir arms. “I do like this.”

“Oh good, this wasn’t even what I was talking about,” Yuuma chuckled.

“We’re starting here, so you just have to keep up, okay?” Alito grinned.

“Keep up?” Astral asked, awareness of the morning wind rustling the trees suddenly disappearing. “Keep up with what?”

“It’s a surprise!” Yuuma replied.

“But how long am I to keep up for? How far are we going? I do not think—“

“Don’t worry about it!” Alito called, already taking off down the road passed the last houses.

“Come on,” Yuuma said, grabbing zir arm. “Did I ever tell you this area was the first place I camped? My whole family used to come out here when I was little… like, really little, and then Akari came with me a few times while our parents were gone. Last year me and Alito managed to drag some of the others out here…”

Yuuma kept up a steady stream as they made their way into the forest, Alito jumping in with details or an embarrassing story about Shark. Ze almost didn’t notice zir shortness of breath as Yuuma pointed out the trails that led to fresh streams or named the birds that called above them.

Ze had just reached the point where zir legs started burning when they reached the stairs. “Oh. Oh, this is what you meant by ‘somewhere I would like.’”

Yuuma bounced on the balls of his feet. “I thought you’d guessed already! Are you excited? I brought all our cards too!” he exclaimed, shifting his backpack around and gripping it in his hands. “So we can practice different ways to make your deck and duel different people at the dojo and Akari won’t tell us to stop wasting time! And I bought you a new pack and it was going to be a surprise but I just can’t wait to show you—“

Alito clapped Astral’s back as Yuuma prattled on. “So you just have to make it up there, okay?”

Astral looked up (and up and up) the path. “Right.”

\---

“Yuuma! Yuuma, stop! I’m dying!” Astral whined breathlessly. “I’m dying and you’re laughing!”

“Astral, cut it out!” Yuuma choked, clutching his stomach. “You’re not dying!”

Astral sprawled across several steps, panting until the fire in zir lungs dampened. “I don’t recall there being this many stairs,” ze finally said in a tone of defeat.

“Well you didn’t have to walk them then,” Yuuma retorted, sitting down beside zim for a moment. “Plus you were too busy moping about Kaito.”

“What about Kaito?” Alito seemed positively unfazed, stretching one arm behind his head.

“Oh yeah, the first time we came here was right after Kaito tried to murder us.”

“Awkward.”

“What isn’t in my life? I mean, you probably tried to kill me more. Come on Astral, we’re practically there.” Ze glared at Yuuma who, grinning, offered his hand.

“In my defense, I was being mind-controlled,” said Alito, jogging in place while Astral stumbled to zir feet. “It was Vector’s fault.”

“But he was being manipulated by Don Thousand.” Astral was slightly horrified to hear them recount the Numbers War like a sporting event.

“Does ‘manipulated’ really count as an excuse for murder though?”

“I mean, I give it to Kaito and Michael, gotta be fair.” Alito laughed.

\---

They did make it there, eventually, and after Astral collapsed on the floor and ate and drank not quite enough to make zimself sick, Yuuma gave zim the new pack; and they did have fun switching out cards and having practice duels, one of which somehow turned into a strange three-team tag-duel against the other visitors to the dojo (which Yuuma, Astral, and Alito won, of course).

After a brief break, Yuuma found Astral sitting on the porch outside, propped up with zir arms behind zim. “You look comfy.”

“My arms are the only part of my body that do not hurt.”

He gave an apologetic laugh. “It’s not like, bad hurt, is it?”

“’Bad hurt’? Is there good hurt?”

“Well, there’s sore hurt and injured hurt.”

“I would know this from my vast physical experiences, I suppose.”

“Oh.” Yuuma sank down beside zim. “Oh, um, well, do you—“

Ze released a breath of laughter. “I trust you, Yuuma.”

His words died in his throat as ze rested zir head on his shoulder, silvery lashes brushing zir round cheeks. “I’ll ask before we go anywhere next time,” he muttered. Ze chuckled again.

Dusk was slowly falling around them, the brightest parts of the sky now only peaking between opening in the forest. “Do you want to stay here tonight and go back in the morning?”

Ze groaned. “Go back… yes, let’s stay here.”

“Ok, I’ll call home in a minute and let them know.”

There was silence as clouds spread colorful fingers across the sky. “Yuuma.”

“Hm?”

“When was it you knew you loved me?”

Yuuma fidgeted in discomfort, careful not to dislodge Astral’s head from his shoulder. “Wh-what’s with that question?” Ze looked up at him with wide, curious eyes until his own darted away. “Well, I knew you were the most important person to me for a long time. I guess… sometime between when we first formed Zexal and when we kicked Vector out of Dr. Faker. And I mean, yeah, I… kinda suspected it was romantic, eventually.”

“Did you? And what was your response to that suspicion?”

“Response?” He remembered nights of clutching the key so hard it left indents in his hand, days of making lists in his notebook margins of all the ways it made no sense to have a crush on an incorporeal alien. “I just tried not to think about it, I guess. I mean, what in the world could I have done about it?”

“What indeed,” Astral replied with a satisfied hum.

He nudged zim with a rueful smile. “What about you?”

Ze sighed, eyes roving across the sky. “I’m afraid I cannot give you such a proper answer. There has never been a moment that I experienced a new emotion and knew it was love. I know the concept of love because it is what I feel for you; what I feel _from_ you. And I believe what we feel for each other has been growing since the moment we met. I had no personal memories then; I still have few memories of anything beyond battles that are not tied to you. Being with you, being part of you… You’ve built an entire world around me. I could not possibly put a moment to that.”

“Augh, god, Astral, don't be so weird! You can’t just say things like that!”

“But I enjoy saying things like that. It makes you blush. You have spent all day making me uncomfortable, I believe I deserve the same opportunity.”

Yuuma shoved zim off his shoulder, but ze merely shifted onto zir other hand, grinning at him with mischief and a heartbreaking warmth in zir eyes.

\---

Over the next few weeks, Alito would show up or Yuuma would drag Astral out and the three of them would train. “Training” was an inaccurate word, Astral pointed out. “Training” implied that this was for something. “For life,” Alito replied, eyes shining. Astral didn’t have a retort for that.

Yuuma could see Astral getting stronger. Ze could get through school and clean-up and the walk home without crashing, and ze didn’t get winded when ze took the stairs too fast. Ze took advantage of being able to eat more. Zir skin glowed and ze put on weight, and looked less like the ethereal spirit ze’d always been and more like a human high school student. (Of course, nothing could remove the otherworldly glint from zir eyes or the way ze moved like ze might start floating, and Yuuma didn’t want anything to.)

Astral slept hard now, too, collapsing into bed at night, sometimes even groaning along with him as the morning alarm sounded. One night, when Yuuma put off finishing his homework until after dinner, he came to bed to find Astral already asleep, sprawled diagonally across the bed. He gave something between a laugh and a huff, squeezing onto the sliver of space left.

“Astral, move over,” he half-whispered. He nudged zim as ze remained unresponsive. “Move!”

 Ze didn’t wake as he shoved zim, inch by inch, onto one side of the bed. He stopped, laughing quietly as he crouched on the bed and Astral laid with one arm under zim, nose smooshed into the mattress and snoring lightly. He could have gone up to the hammock, he realized belatedly, but, well, he’d gotten used to sharing a bed with Astral. He liked it, he admitted to himself grudgingly. He really, really liked it. Not for weird reasons, of course—sure, the first time had gotten weird, like, an enjoyable kind of weird, but a kind of weird they probably shouldn’t be at right now and—anyway, he hadn’t shared a bed with anyone since he was small, and there was something to be said for the warmth beside him as he fell asleep, for the conversations they started and couldn’t remember finishing by the morning. Sometimes, half-dreaming, Yuuma would realize that Astral was beside him, and it seemed like the most miraculous thing in the world, the most unlikely turn of events that could have led to Astral stretched out, warm and solid and peaceful, beside him.

He was just laying down when the door creaked open and he froze. Akari appeared in the block of light from the hallway, his homework in her hand. “Oh,” she half-whispered, “I thought you were asleep and didn’t want you to… forget… Yuuma, what are you doing?”

He shook his head. “It’s not…”

He couldn’t see her face in the contrasting light, but she jerked her hand up, thumb pointing out to the hall. He quickly got up and followed her.

She didn’t look as mad as he’d expected. He wasn’t sure what her expression was. “Yuuma, are you two sleeping together?”

“No!” He waved his hands rapidly. “I mean… I mean in the literal sense yes, but we’re not…”

“I know that,” she sighed in exasperation.

He pouted, remembering her initial accusations. “Do you?”

“Oh shut up.” She sighed again. “Look, I know you’re not a child anymore. You’re not an adult,” she added, glaring at him, “but you’re not a child. I… _mostly_ trust your judgement. Astral I’m less sure about.”

Yuuma’s skin prickled. “I’m not trying to take advantage of zim! It was zir idea anyway!”

“Calm down, I didn’t say you were! But why would ze ask that?”

“Ze said… ze wanted to be with me at night. Look, I can’t explain every stupid way people read into everything, _I_ don’t even understand half the time and ze’d just get confused about what ze’s supposed to think about things.”

“And I’m just asking you to think about that. Ze hasn’t even been here two months, and you yourself said you weren’t ‘technically dating’ when ze first showed up. But you spend every waking and, apparently, sleeping moment together.”

“Oh come on, ze can’t just do everything by zimself, ze has no idea what ze’s supposed to do!” Anyway, whose business was it if they wanted to be together all the time? They had four years of not being together to make up for.

Akari held up a hand. “You’re the one who knows what any of this means. Okay, maybe you decide it’s just societal bullshit and it doesn’t matter, but you’re the only one with the frame of reference to make that decision. I’m just saying to think about how much responsibility you’re willing to take before making those decisions.”

Yuuma paused— _was_ he taking too much responsibility in their relationship? Alright, sure, if he heard that someone else his age had dated someone for two months and was living with them and sleeping with them, he’d think it was weird. But well, it didn’t work the same way for them. And that stuff didn’t actually matter. Right?

They stood in silence, until she finally continued, “Well, go ahead, I’m not going to install cameras in your room. And hey—you can talk to me about this stuff if you need to. I mean, yeah, it’ll be really awkward,” Yuuma nodded along in agreement, “but it’s more important that you know you can talk to me.”

“Thanks,” he finally said grudgingly. She punched him in the arm as she went down the stairs. “Ow.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't take this as advice on exercise (especially if you're a newly physical alien), I don't know what I'm talking about and just wanted to write more about Astral being embodied and have Alito there. Next chapter shouldn't take nearly as long (I already have several scenes written), but life is life so I make no promises. Please send me any feedback you have, complimentary or constructive! Thanks for reading!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Potential warnings: aphobia, harassment, sex/gender/sexuality themes (not all these things are directly present, but at least close enough that I thought deserved a warning). These things may be present in future chapters from here on out, but I’ll try to put warnings before each chapter. If I need to warn for anything else let me know.

Yuuma informed Astral a week in advance that they were invited to Shark and Rio’s birthday party.

“Don’t say anything to them though, it’s a surprise!”

“That we are attending? Then how were we invited?”

“What? No—the party is a surprise. Kotori roped Durbe and Alito into planning it with her.”

“Ah. Is there a significance to their current age? I do not recall surprise birthday parties occurring in the past.”

“Eh, not really, they’re just turning nineteen. I think Kotori just wanted to do something for Rio.”

“Are not Shark and Rio a year older than you?”

“A year and a bit, yeah. My eighteenth birthday is coming up soon too!”

“Didn’t we decide that I am eighteen? That means I am older than you.”

 “Astral, that’s not your real—ugh.” Ze grinned at him.

They arrived at the Kamishiro mansion five minutes late, but of course Kotori knew Yuuma enough that this was still fifteen minutes before Durbe was supposed to bring Shark and Rio back. They spent a moment greeting everyone before worrying about getting into position.

“Kaito, I didn’t know you’d be here!” Yuuma called.

“Haruto wanted to come,” Kaito replied with a shrug.

“And Mizael wanted _him_ to come,” Haruto added as Kaito gently elbowed him.

“Hey!” Mizael objected, ruffling his hair. “I wanted you to come too.” Haruto giggled.

“You’re looking better, Astral,” Kaito continued, pointedly ignoring his brother and his…? Astral wasn’t sure what Mizael was to Kaito, actually.

“Thank you,” ze replied, as Alito struck a proud pose over in zir left field of vision.

“Everything going alright? Do you need help with anything?”

Ze was surprised at his concern, though that seemed a little unfair on zir part. “Actually, Yuuma mentioned that Haruto is currently learning something that I need to review before we cover new material in class. Would you two be free soon so that I could go over it with him?”

“Of course!” Haruto shouted, jumping into the conversation. “You can come over whenever! And you have a new deck, right? We can finally duel after we’re done!”

Astral was grinning when Kotori called out, “Okay, everyone hide! Durbe says they’re coming up!”

Yuuma grabbed Astral’s hand and hid them behind the staircase on the far side of the door. As the room went dark, ze asked, “How long will we hide?”

“They should be here in a second, and we’ll jump out and shout ‘surprise’,” he whispered, giving zim a quick kiss that landed half on zir lips and half on zir cheek.

The reality occurred precisely as explained: they heard the door opening, then Durbe flipped the lights and everyone jumped out to Shark and Rio’s surprise.

Kotori ran up to them, but their conversation was lost in the general hubbub, until Rio shouted out, “I have the best girlfriend,” leaning over and kissing Kotori’s cheek. Kotori blushed intensely.

 Alito snorted beside them. “That’s one way to announce it.”

“Huh.” Yuuma didn’t look particularly surprised. “You’re not upset though? I thought you and Kotori were getting back together.”

“We are,” he replied, flashing a grin and a peace sign.

“Oh, nice! Actually, it makes a lot of sense that you’d be cool with that, since you tried to date me and her that one time…”

Alito winced. “That was three years ago, I didn’t know what I was doing, I’m sorry, and you can stop bringing it up!”

Yuuma laughed and made some reply that was drowned out as Durbe, who had disappeared into the kitchen, returned with a cake alight with candles and began a simplistic song that Astral didn’t know, but which everyone else joined in on. Shark seemed to grumble at Rio for the duration, but at the end they both leaned down and blew out the candles together.

Yuuma darted forward as Kotori began cutting the cake and returned with two slices, one of which he handed over to Astral. It was deliciously sweet and spongey, and ze savored it while slices were passed out to everyone. Haruto soon joined them with his and chatted happily for a while, until Kaito told him they had to leave soon and, after a little pouting, they went to say goodbye to the twins.

Anna came up after that, as boisterous as ever, teasing the two of them in ways Astral couldn’t quite follow but made Yuuma blush as he stammered out protests. Michael and Thomas came up after her, the former asking excitedly if Astral had finished the book he lent zim about that lost city. Ze hadn’t quite answered when Thomas saw Shark go by and complained loudly about how boring underage parties were, resulting in an argument that involved Shark shouting, “I didn’t even invite you!”

Spectators crowded to watch the fight; when they dispersed, Gilag saw Yuuma and Astral there, and they wound up talking about his new position at work and whether he would go to college next year or not.

Later, Yuuma guided them to a table where food and drinks had been laid out. Astral got distracted there for a while; when ze finally looked up from zir sampling, Yuuma was in the middle of the room, surrounded by a crowd of his friends as he talked to Shark.

It was loud. Everyone here was someone ze liked (for the most part), but ze wasn’t sure how long ze could deal with being around them all. So instead of squeezing zir way through the crowd, ze slunk backwards, finding a seat that had been shoved along the wall and sinking into it.

\---

As Vector surveyed the room, he spotted Astral in a large padded chair in the corner of the room, looking anxious. He grinned and made his way over.

“Hey, Blue.” Vector slid down into the seat beside zim, forcing zim to pull zir arms and legs in as he rubbed against zim. “How’s it going?”

“Better before you arrived,” ze replied tightly.

He placed a hand gently over his chest. “Wow, rude. What did I ever do to you?”

He saw the very, very long list in Astral’s eyes as ze rounded on him. Zir restraint was visible as ze replied, “You have never given me a reason to be glad of your presence, that is certain. And I have a name which is not ‘blue’.”

Vector sneered. “Sorry, did you expect me to be more grateful to you for bringing me back?”

“I expect precisely nothing from you,” Astral replied coldly, crossing zir arms over zir chest and leaning away from him.

“Oooh? Then why go through the trouble? Just wanted to see my pretty face again?”

“Because Yuuma cried for your loss. That is the only reason.” Ze narrowed zir eyes at him as ze continued, “So do not doubt that if your presence makes him cry, I will remove it, and I won’t need the Numeron Code to do that.”

Vector was surprised, but not intimidated, by the threat. He let a shit-eating grin overtake his face as he said in shock, “Me, make Yuuma cry? Oh, I’m long past that part of my life.” He dismissed the idea with a flamboyant wave of his hand. “Quite the opposite now. Really, we’ve gotten even closer these past few years, while you’ve been gone. _Very close_.” When Astral didn’t deign to reply, he carefully worded a second taunt. “So you don’t need to worry about me making him cry. Maybe about me making him do other things…”

He could tell he’d caught Astral’s interest. “Other things? Even if you tired of being a decent human, Yuuma would never let you talk him into doing anything evil.”

“You think I’m a decent human? Blue, you’re making me blush! But no, no. _Naughty_ , maybe, but not evil.”

“I… do not understand.”

“And that’s the problem, isn’t it?” Vector mused, seemingly to himself, as he slid his arms along the chair back behind Astral and crossed a leg over his knee, thigh half in zir lap. “Well, it’s nothing you _could_ understand anyway, poor imitation of a human that you are. Poor Yuuma, he’ll just keep missing out, won’t he?”

“Missing out? What has Yuuma missed out on?”

“Oh, lots, while you’ve been gone. He’s been pining away waiting for you, letting his life pass him by.”

“That is not true,” Astral scoffed. “Even if Yuuma did miss me, even—even as much as I missed him, he would not let it stop him from living his life.”

“ _If_ he missed you? You don’t sound so secure there Blue.” Ze started to respond, but he powered over zim. “Anyway, that’s true for most areas of his life, but there were some that he was waiting for you for.”

“What?”

“Love,” he said wistfully, batting his eyelashes, then sneered. “You know. Romance. Sex. All his friends are dating and falling in love and getting laid, and Yuuma’s just waiting on the sidelines. Not for lack of offers, either,” he finished, waggling his brows.

He was satisfied that Astral was thoroughly confused, but ze was too angry now to admit it and ask for explanations. Vector felt delight blossoming in his chest and tickling his throat, threatening to make him laugh outright, but he held back the urge while Astral prepared zir retort.

“That cannot be true either. Yuuma has told me he has dated several people.”

Vector scoffed. “As if that counts as dating. Kotori never even got a kiss for her troubles, and she tried the longest. He never got close to anyone as anything other than friends.” He leaned in close and cooed, “Maybe he remembered that you’re the jealous type.”

He could see that jab hit the mark, and he didn’t plan on giving Astral space to recover from it. “Did the waiting at least pay off for him?” he asked as he leaned back.

“What?”

 “Have you two even kissed?”

“Yes we—I mean, that is none of your concern!”

Vector laughed at zir flustered rage, spinning up and slamming his palms against the chair arms on either side of zim, making zim flinch. “But you haven’t fucked. I can tell because you don’t even know what I’m talking about. Poor Yuuma, all that waiting and he’s still left high and dry. Well, if you won’t satisfy him, let him know he’s got other options—”

Astral stood and shoved him away in a fluid motion. “Hey!” he cried with laughter as he caught himself on his hands. “Look who can’t take a joke!” Ze strode away quickly, shoulders hunched and not looking back, confused and injured. He smiled, feeling supremely self-satisfied.

\---

“Look who can’t take a joke!”

Yuuma turned as the party fell silent. Vector lay half-sprawled on the floor, laughing to himself, as Astral fled the room. He hurried over, but Shark beat him to Vector.

“What the hell did you do to zim?” Shark demanded.

“It was just some harmless teasing,” Vector replied with a shrug. His expression turned from smug to distressed as Shark put his foot on his shoulder and started pushing him into the floor.

Yuuma moved passed them, ignoring Vector’s squeaks of protest, down the hall and out the front door. Astral stood under the streetlight, arms wrapped tightly across zir chest. “Astral!” he called, jogging down to the sidewalk as ze turned. “What’s wrong? What happened?”

Ze met his gaze as he pulled up beside zim. There was something fragile in zir eyes that twisted his heart, but ze looked away and curtly replied, “Nothing.”

He gripped zir shoulders and turned zim to him. “Bullshit. What’d he do to make you so upset?”

Astral hesitated, eyes on the ground, before swinging them back up into his. “Does it bother you that I am not…” Ze bit back zir words and tried again. “That I do not understand everything about being human?”

He blinked at zim. “Who does?” Ze looked confused, so he continued, “I mean, no, it doesn’t. You know plenty of stuff, and anyway,” he cracked a grin, “it gives me a chance to get back at you for making fun of me when I didn’t know how to duel.”

Ze pouted at him, and he pressed, “Was that all that was about?”

Zir eyes drifted away again. “Essentially.”

He gave a small laugh. “You shouldn’t let something like that bother you, just tell him to stop being a dick.” He watched his breath form a faint cloud in the air. “It’s getting late anyway, wanna say goodbye and head home?”

Ze nodded and they headed back towards the house. As they neared the front door, Astral murmured, “Yuuma, do you…”

He paused, waiting. “What?”

Ze shook zir head, smiling slightly as ze opened the door. “Nothing.”

\---

Back when Astral was a spirit and Yuuma a child, ze had asked him what sex was. He had gotten intensely flustered and gave some winding and vague response that didn’t actually tell Astral anything. Ze’d gotten the question from a TV show, which had also given zim several rough estimations about the word: it was an act that humans performed together, but there were a lot of complicated rules regarding which humans could do so and when, and it seemed to be tied to both reproduction and romantic relationships in some way. It was pleasurable, and humans desired it, to such an extent that they might make poor decisions or betray someone in some way to engage in it (there had been lots of slapping and yelling in that episode). However, sometimes they didn't desire it, and this could cause conflict with someone who did. In addition, there was also something potentially dirty or immoral about it, despite its apparent pleasure and desirability. These contradictory bits of information frustrated Astral’s attempts to make sense of it, and without any way of getting additional data, ze shuffled it away into the list of human things ze couldn’t understand.

Now, though, Astral didn’t have to rely on Yuuma to get information—with a body, the entirety of human knowledge was accessible. With Vector’s accusation eating at zim ( _“you don’t even know what I’m talking about”_ ), ze began searching.

The results didn’t offer much clarification at first—there were mentions of desire, satisfaction, inhibition, dysfunction. Ze saw a word Yuuma had explained—monogamy—along with the complement polyamory, which seemed to be why Kotori could be the girlfriend of both Rio and Alito. As ze tried more specifications (“human sex,” “sex act,” “sex romantic”), ze started to develop a clearer picture.

In addition to an act, it was a word for biological traits of humans. There were two diagrams of the area around the hips and thighs, labeled male and female. Astral thought of Kotori’s explanation of gender, and how her parents had wrongly assumed hers because of how she looked, and realized this was likely what she meant. There were labels for every part, some of which ze’d heard before but most of which ze hadn’t, and an accompanying explanation of reproductive functions that lined up with what ze’d already known about DNA merger. Astral didn’t seem to match either picture, but further searching yielded the term ‘intersex’ and the claim that the distinctions were made-up approximations anyway. Ze felt a little better about that.

There were various sexual orientations: people who were attracted to a different gender, to the same gender, to anyone, to no one. Ze wondered why gender was so important for sex, and why the act shared a name with the body types that people guessed an infant’s gender from.

Then there were the purposes of sex. Reproduction was clearly one, but it was typically only possible between two people with very specific organ functions, and that was not the only combination with which people had sex. Even for those who could reproduce, there were all sorts of medicines and devices to prevent it. Rather, the usual purpose seemed to be what Astral had previously gathered: desire and pleasure.

And now ze was finally figuring out what the act itself was, or as it turned out, what variety of acts were all called sex. The pleasure seemed to center around the physical stimulation of genitals (as certain parts were called). This was done with hands or mouths or other genitals. A great deal of the described activities involved the insertion of something into certain orifices. Ze tried not to be horrified at this.

Ze thought another diagram, or perhaps a demonstration, might calm the turmoil of confusion spreading through zim. Clicking around led zim to a video—the man and woman in it were kissing, which was familiar by now, but as the video continued zir discomfort only increased. The two shed their clothes and climbed atop a bed, and…

 Astral shut the video off, feeling sick.

That’s what Yuuma had meant when they had been kissing in bed. Zir face burned—of course, they’d been kissing, on a bed no less, at Astral’s request, and… there had certainly been an obvious flow of events in the video. Did Yuuma want to do that with zim? Ze wasn’t even sure which activities zir body was capable of. Ze remembered Vector’s other taunt: “ _if you won’t satisfy him, let him know he’s got other options._ ” Did _Vector_ want to do that with Yuuma?

The thought sent a jealous burning through zim, but it wasn’t strong enough to cover the disgust ze felt writhing beneath zir skin that almost made zim wish ze didn’t have a body to feel it with. Images appeared as quickly as ze could suppress them, of Yuuma and zim or Vector and Yuuma in the place of the people in the video. Zir hands crept up to cover zir face, and the contrast between zir scorching face and frigid hands was shocking. Vector was right: ze couldn’t understand this, and if this was a requisite part of being human, ze truly was a poor imitation.

\---

Astral wasn’t zimself.

Yuuma wasn’t sure why—it seemed to have come on slowly, long silences on their walks to school, downcast eyes at lunch. Ze avoided making the plans with Haruto they’d discussed, then shirked their next training session with Alito. Ze’d become so acquiescent to them, having moved on from basic fitness to self-defense, that Alito didn’t even know how to counter this.

One night after they finished their homework (school seemed to be the only thing Astral could commit to now), Yuuma said, “Hey, Astral, you know you’re doing fine, right? Like, if you’re still worried about knowing everything…”

“Mm?” Zir eyes focused on him from wherever they’d been—ze always seemed distracted now. “Oh, yes. Thank you, Yuuma.” Zir tone was polite and devoid of meaning, and when they went to bed, ze wrapped the blanket around zimself like a cocoon.

“I don’t know what’s going on!” Yuuma ranted to Kotori one afternoon after school, when Astral had declined their invitation to the mall and instead remained sitting in Yuuma’s room, a book in zir lap and zir eyes out the window. “I know something’s wrong, ze always got like this when ze didn’t want to talk about a problem.”

“Maybe ze’s just overwhelmed right now. I know ze’s been adapting well, but literally zir entire life has changed in a really short time—maybe it’s just catching up to zim.”

Yuuma sighed through a pout. “Yeah, I thought maybe I should give zim some space today. Ze used to be able to go into the key when ze needed time alone.” He wondered if Akari’s words were already coming to haunt him, and shook his head in frustration. “I just want to help zim get over whatever this is, get us back to where we were.”

“When the world was ending?” she asked sardonically.

“Yeah, think I could ask Shark or Vector if they feel like ending the world anytime soon? Or maybe I should ask you to call in favors with your boyfriend and girlfriend,” he added with a teasing grin.

She elbowed him none too gently. “I finally don’t have any relationship problems, don’t try to pawn yours off on me.”

His mirth faded quickly, and his eyes returned to roving the passing windows aimlessly. “Hey, you don’t think Vector said something else to zim, do you?”

Kotori hummed thoughtfully. “Like what? Astral doesn’t give a damn about what Vector thinks, I don’t know what he could say to make zim really upset.”

“You’re right,” Yuuma muttered. “It just seemed like it started when…” He trailed off, eyes widening as he spotted a display in the window to his left. “Oh my god, I totally forgot about that! That’s perfect!”

He said goodbye to Kotori at the train and returned to his house with a shopping bag in one hand.

“Yuuma!” his grandmother called from the kitchen.

“Hi grandma,” he replied, making his way towards her. “Is Astral—Astral!”

Ze stood at the countertop, pink dough spread out before zim. “Yuuma! I am learning to make mochi!”

“Oh, wow.” Yuuma hid the package behind his back until Astral turned back to his grandma for a moment, and he could shove it under the couch. He wanted to wrap it before he gave it to zim—wrapping paper seemed like the sort of thing that would entrance Astral.

“I know how much Astral loves to eat, so since you left zim all alone I thought I’d offer a lesson.”

“I did say that I decided to stay behind,” Astral added apologetically.

Yuuma gave a snort of laughter. Astral had a smear of flour on zir cheek that reminded him of zir markings, and zir expression was open and untroubled by anything but the mochi triangles ze was cutting. When his grandma busied herself putting ingredients away, he leaned over the counter, chest heavy with emotion, and said softly, “I love you.”

Zir eyes lit up in response. “You do.” It was not a question, but perhaps a statement of realization, like remembering the placement of a lost item. Zir mouth curved in a smile as bright as zir eyes, and then their lips met, and though it was light and brief zir smile tasted like sunrises (and a little bit like flour).

“Yuuma, at least let Astral put the knife down first!”

His face heated as he jumped back, stammering an apology as Astral gave a flustered laugh.

Later, after dinner and snacking on zir creations, preparing for the morning, ze asked him a question.

“Yuuma… why did you never date Vector?”

“What?”

“You dated many other people, to… be sure, I think you said. And you have mentioned that Vector asked you out several times. Why did you not accept?”

“Really? And here I thought you’d appreciate my judgement.”

“I did not make any implication of my opinion,” ze huffed, turning to load zir school bag.

He laughed. “Uh, well… I knew he wasn’t serious.”

Ze turned back cautiously. “What do you mean?”

“Like, he was just fucking with me. He didn’t _actually_ want to date me. He just, I dunno, wanted to get a reaction or something.”

Astral looked at him contemplatively. “I see.”

“Why’d you ask?”

Ze shrugged. “Curiosity.”


End file.
